
Class __'F'_7J^__ 
Copyright ]J^ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



@ Books by William Root Bliss ^5; 

% % 

^ September Days on Nantucket ^ 

^ Crown 8vo, gilt top, ^i.oo, net ^ 

^ Quaint Nantucket ^ 

^ Crown 8vo, gilt top, ^1.50. ^ 

y Colonial Times on Buzzard's Bay ^ 

III New Edition. Crown 8vo, gilt top, ^1.50. ,g» 

^ The Old Colony Town, and Other ^ 

^ Sketches ^ 

^ Crown 8vo, gUt top, ^1.25. ^ 

^ Side Glimpses from the Colonial Meet- ^ 

@i ING-HOUSE @i 

jgj, Crown 8vo, gUt top, #1.50. ^ 

@ = ^ 

^ Published by @ 

^ Messrs. Houghton^ Mifflin ^ Company @ 

® & Sold by all the Booksellers ® 



SEPTEMBER DAYS ON 
NANTUCKET 



BY 



WILLIAM ROOT BLISS 




BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 

1902 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 

Two Copies Received 

JUN. 6 1902 

f^COPVmOHT ENTRY 

OUSS CL XXa No. 
COPY B. 



COPYRIGHT, 1902, BY WILLIAM ROOT BLISS 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



Published June, IQ02 



Tou neednot fear for a surfeit; 
here is but little^ and that is 
light of digestion, — Q u ar l e s . 



TO 

MISS NINA ROWLAND 

OF 
NANTUCKET ANCESTRY 



THE DIARY 



Sunday 
A Voyage to the Island .... 


PAGE 

1 


Monday 
Old Windmills and Young Women 


9 


Tuesday 
Old Houses and Ghosts .... 


6^ 



Wednesday 

SlASCONSET AND SeA WoRSHIPERS . 73 

Thursday 

SURFSIDE AND ToM NeVER .... 89 

Friday 

MaDDAQUET AND THE MeN WITH A HoE 99 

Saturday 
Wauwinet and Sankaty Light . ill 

Sunday Morn 
The Town and the Captains . . 123 



BY-THE-WAY 

^wo comrades went to Nantucket for a 
week's vacation. The island had been calling 
them a long time ; hut they waited for the 
cloudless days of September^ when the throng 
of visitors has gone and summer is still lin- 
gering there ; when not a leaf of the shrub- 
beries on hillsides and moorlands has lost its 
brilliancy^ nor one of the little wild flowers 
peeping up from the sods has wilted ; when 
at noontimes they can lie undisturbed on sea- 
scented beaches^ and gaze on an ocean spar- 
kling in the mild sunlight of September, 

Herein is their Nantucket 'Diary; descrip- 
tive^ reminiscent^ slightly historical^ and fla- 
vored by the sea. 



A Voyage to the Island 



SEPTEMBER DAYS ON 
NANTUCKET 

A Voyage to the Island 

C^ 5 About nine o'clock this 

^3ttlt63'P > morning we sailed from 
FIRST DAY \ New Bedford in the good 
steamer Nantucket. We crossed Buzzard's 
Bay, stopped at Woods Hole, crossed Vine- 
yard Sound, stopped at Cottage City, and 
then began a rolling voyage to Nantucket, 
twenty-five miles southeast by south. 

When our steamer left the last landing, 
she faced a dry easterly wind, which soon 
began to tear wreaths of spray from the 
crests of the sea ; and when off Cape Poge, 
she was rolling and pitching so severely 
that those passengers only who had sea-legs 
could move about the decks. Occasionally 
a wave struck her in the face; then she 
3 



September Days on Nantucket 

paused, shivered under the force of the 
blow, and pushed forward on her contested 
voyage. 

** Her hull rose high, her bows dipped low. 

The surges flashed a-lee ; 
And the man at the wheel sang low, 

Sang he, — 

* O sea-room and lee-room. 

And a gale to run afore. 

Southeast by south. 

And a bone in her mouth. 
When bound to Nantucket shore.' ** 

Persons who assume to know the cause 
of seasickness say that it comes from a dis- 
turbance of the nerve centres produced by 
a lack of coincidence between the optical 
and the physical sensations ; the meaning 
of which seems to be that if the voyager 
sees one thing and feels another, seasick- 
ness will ensue. To learn the truth by ex- 
perience, we seated ourselves in the after- 
most part of the steamer, on the upper deck, 
and watched her various motions, accom- 
4 



A Voyage to the Island 

panying them by similar movements of 
our bodies ; when we saw her head going 
down into the seas, breathing out we 
went down with it ; when we saw it rising 
from the plunge, breathing in we rose 
with it; when she rolled from larboard to 
starboard, we followed the roll. Thus we 
kept ourselves in harmony with the steam- 
er's actions, and found enjoyment in the 
wild commotion, as well as an assurance 
that — 

"A life on the ocean wave, 
A home on the rolling deep," 

can bring upon us no discomforts. 

Unfortunately, all our fellow passengers 
were not so happy as we were. Some were 
feeding Mother Carey's chickens; others, 
who were sitting in silence, with closed 
eyes and pallid faces, showed in various 
ways that the voyage was to them a long 
period of misery. One suffering woman 
preferred to lie prostrate on the deck. 
5 



September Days on Nantucket 

Could she have spoken, her thought would 
have been found in the words of old Gon- 
zalo in " The Tempest," — 

" Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an 
acre of barren ground ! * ' 

When the steamer arrived at Nantucket, 
many people were on the wharf awaiting 
her; not because they were interested in 
anything that she brought, but in pur- 
suance of an old custom to go down and 
look at every arrival from the sea. That 
is something for idlers on an island to do. 
They told us that the steamer had not 
been expected to make the voyage until 
the gale had blown itself out. 

We spent the remainder of the day at 
our comfortable inn. The throng of guests 
which filled it to overflowing in July and 
August had gone; a few had come to 
enjoy the September days. 

To refresh our memories concerning 
the history of Nantucket, one of us read 
6 



A Voyage to the Island 

aloud a narrative of its settlement, of its 
sea-rovers, and of the great power which 
the Quaker Society formerly exercised 
over the social and civil affairs of the 
island. If there are now any members of 
that sect on Nantucket, they speak low 
and go quietly their own ways. Some- 
times there is heard a discussion whether 
the Society is decaying elsewhere; and 
occasionally a statistician attempts to fig- 
ure out whether its members, by reason of 
a devotion to quietism, live longer than 
other people. Their small and well-gov- 
erned communities, existing in various 
parts of the country, as well as in Eng- 
land, give no serious thought to such in- 
quiries. They pursue the even tenor of 
their way, conscious of the fact that the 
past influence of Quakerism can never be 
revived. 



Old JVindmilh and Young 
Tf^omen 



Old fVindmills and Toung Women 

QS We spent this sunny 
Ontiat > forenoon on a hilltop 
SECOND DAY \ west of the town, where 
stands a windmill that began to grind 
" the towne's come " in the year 1 746. It 
is the most interesting remembrancer of 
colonial times that Nantucket can show to 
its visitors. The structure resembles the 
windmills which Thoreau saw on Cape 
Cod fifty years ago, — a tall, octagonal 
tower, shingled on its roof and sides; a 
long timber slanting from its top towards 
the ground, the lower end of it resting in 
the hub of a cart-wheel by which the arms 
that move the grinding machinery are 
turned to face the wind when the grinding 
is to begin. 

The mill door was open. Within it 
II 



September Days on Nantucket 

sat the keeper, a gentle old man, who, it 
pleased us to imagine, is a lineal descend- 
ant of the first miller. He sat near the 
door, as if waiting for corn to be brought 
from the town, that he might earn the 
multure, paid in colonial times, of "two 
quarts for every bushel he grindeth." It 
was a reminder of Don Quixote's " thirty 
or forty windmills all together," when he 
told us that " once there were four wind- 
mills all together " whirling sixteen giant 
arms in the wind. Standing on an eleva- 
tion of sixty feet above the sea level, those 
arms were the first landmarks to be seen 
from a ship approaching the island, and 
the last to fade from the sight of whale- 
men outward bound. " I must tell you," 
said the keeper, " that no Nantucket man 
or boy returning home from a long voyage 
could come in sight of those windmills 
without feeling his eyes considerably wet. 
I 've been there myself; " and the gentle old 
man wiped his eyes as if he were there now. 

12 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

We can imagine the story : The ship 
has been cruising three or four years, and 
for a long time its company has been 
without news from Nantucket. When 
she comes within sight of the windmills, 
and her signal flags are read on shore, and 
her name is known, and town boys are 
striving to earn the fee of a silver dollar 
by being the first to report the arrival to 
families who have relatives on board, and 
a boat is rowed from the harbor to meet 
the ship when she comes to an anchor 
outside the bar, and to ask if all her com- 
pany are living, or who is dead, it may be 
believed that a wave of emotion runs 
through the town as well as through the 
ship. There was a time when such occur- 
rences were frequent at Nantucket. 

Tarrying on the hilltop, we surveyed the 
prospect which extends beyond the town, 
beyond green fields, and far away over the 
ocean. How solitary appeared the posi- 
tion of the island. A visitor to the town 
13 



September Days on Nantucket 

sixty years ago would have noticed busy 
scenes surrounding many vessels moored 
at the wharves. To-day there is not a ship 
in the harbor, nor a ship anchored at the 
bar, nor a ship in sight on the surrounding 
sea ; there is not a sheep grazing in fields 
where once the flocks were numbered by 
thousands ; there is not a sound of labor 
in the town, which was once a hive of in- 
dustry, where coopers, sail-makers, spar- 
makers, boat-builders, ropewalks, forges, 
candle factories, were at work the livelong 
day, with no lull in their noises except 
when the steeple bell summoned every- 
body home to dinner. 

While men made the industrial noises 
of the town, women were numerous enough 
to make its opinions. They always out- 
numbered the men, and this disparity in 
numbers increased when the whale-ships 
sailed on long voyages farther and farther 
from Nantucket. Immediately after the 
Revolution, they were cruising as far south 
14 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

of the equator as the Falkland Islands. 
The ships were small, not exceeding two 
hundred and fifty tons burden, dull sailers, 
and scantily outfitted. Some of the car- 
goes were carried direct to London for a 
market, and were of large value, such as 
that of a ship commanded by Ransom 
Jones, which carried 7000 barrels of oil 
and 70,000 sealskins. When the news 
reached Nantucket, about the year 1789, 
that a packet of the East India Company, 
homeward bound to London, had seen 
sperm whales off the coast of Madagascar, 
two ships, that had just returned from 
Greenland, were immediately fitted out for 
what was called " a voyage of discovery in 
the Indian Ocean." ^ These were the first 
Nantucket ships that sailed beyond the 
Cape of Good Hope. A few years later 
Nantucket ships were hunting their gigan- 
tic game in the Pacific Ocean. 

^ Ship Penelope, Captain James Whippey ; Ship 
Canton, Captain John Worth. 

15 



September Days on Nantucket 

During the absence of many men on 
these long voyages the streets of the town 
had an air of desolation, which was not 
dispelled by the visiting activities of the 
women who, clothed in plain gowns of 
sombre colors, passed to and fro, seeking 
company and a " dish of tea " in their 
neighbors' homes. 

At this period the town contained one 
dwelling-house built of brick, and five hun- 
dred and thirty houses built of wood ; they 
were plain without and within, represent- 
ing the simple architectural ideas of a sea- 
going people. Many of the houses stood 
on top of the hill which slopes up from the 
edge of the harbor. At the foot of the hill 
were three wharves, each a hundred feet 
long ; when ships returned from successful 
voyages, there was a great bustle of business 
on the landing-place at the head of the 
wharves. Here barrels of whale oil were 
stored, in readiness for shipment to a mar- 
ket in Boston or London ; and the smell of 
' i6 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

oil became the all-pervading odor of the 
town. Between the landing-place and the 
top of the hill was the town's meadow, sur- 
rounded by a fence ; within it the herds of 
cows were kept after they had been driven 
in from the pastures at sundown. The 
streets were in no wise picturesque. They 
were lanes of sand, without names, without 
pavements, without footpaths, and were 
never lighted at night. Although the town 
was a great warehouse of illuminating oil, 
the Quaker merchants who owned it re- 
fused, year after year, to sell it for street 
lights, because, as they said, the price of 
oil is either high or low ; if high, the select- 
men of the town must not increase our 
taxes by buying it; if low, the owners 
cannot afford to sell it. 

When the women were not going on 
their incessant visits afoot, they rode in two- 
wheeled horse-carts, over which a canvas 
awning was sometimes stretched. This 
vehicle, called a calash, was the only form 
17 



September Days on Nantucket 

of carriage on the island, until two wealthy- 
Quakers, persuaded by their young people, 
ordered each a fashionable chaise from 
Boston. Any unnecessary expenditure of 
money was an immorality in the Quaker 
view of life, and therefore when those bril- 
liant vehicles appeared in the streets the 
community was alarmed, and the ruin of 
the families of the importers was predicted. 
One man repented and sent his chaise back 
to Boston. The other repented not, but 
used his chaise until the townspeople be- 
came accustomed to it, when some of them 
sent orders to Boston for the same novel 
vehicle. 

The disparity of numbers between the 
sexes made a young woman's chances of 
marriage in Nantucket far from even. 
Beaux were scarce, as they were in every 
seaport town. The scarcity is mentioned 
in a letter from Elizabeth Rotch to her 
cousin Sarah Hazard, visiting in New 
York : " I am surprised to hear thee com- 
i8 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

plain of beaus being scarce in New York, 
for I always had the idea they were very 
plenty ; perhaps it is of the younger class, 
as they must be somewhat advanc'd be- 
fore they merit that appellation. Well, 
thee will find more of a scarcity on thy 
return." 

If a Quaker girl of Nantucket married 
a Gentile, she was disowned by the Society 
unless she wrote a confession of repentance 
for doing what some of them said was the 
best act of their lives. The reality of the 
Quaker religion was such a great fact that 
managers of the Society did not hesitate to 
ignore the plainest truths about human na- 
ture by punishing both men and women 
who married out of the sect. Members of 
the Society were " set aside " if they merely 
witnessed the marriage of an acquaintance 
who was not a Quaker. It was their com- 
mon practice to attend such marriages and 
absent themselves from the room during 
the performance of the ceremony. In one 
19 



September Days on Nantucket 

instance of record, more than thirty Quaker 
guests left the room and returned after the 
ceremony, in order not to witness it and 
make themselves liable to discipline. 

But the Society did an act of justice to 
its women when it disowned Silas Ray, 
who, turning his back to the pretty girls 
of Nantucket, had "gone out in marriage 
with a woman in New Jersey." And yet 
he may not have deserved that treatment; 
for those scientific persons who have stud- 
ied the physiography and botany of Nan- 
tucket are positive that these things prove 
the island to be a portion of New Jersey 
thrust up from the ocean. 

What did young women do to pass 
away the time when the young men were 
absent on whaling voyages ? 

There was but little of " the soft play 
of life " in their experience. Music and 
dancing were forbidden pleasures. But 
as the wind bloweth where it listeth, so 
the love of those pleasures, born in the 

20 



Old Windmills and Toung Women 

hearts of Quaker maidens, declared itself 
in spite of the Book of Discipline, and 
found vent in the homes of Gentile neigh- 
bors. When they were suspected of such 
acts, the selectmen of the town appointed 
night-watchmen " to suppress " what they 
called " the growing disorder of the young 
people that act inconsistently with the 
principles of morality and virtue." ^ 

Some traded in small wares ; taught, for 
the wage of sixteen cents per week for 
each pupil, in the excellent schools of the 
Quaker Society, whose children were edu- 
cated apart from the children of "the 
world's people." They wove flax and 
wool cloths for home use and for barter ; 
and occasionally they rode in their ca- 

1 The Gentiles were members of the sects (other than 
Quakers) mentioned in this paragraph from the Diary of 
President Stiles of Yale College: "July 31st, 1772. Mr. 
Shaw tells me Nantucket contains no Baptists, 4 or 5 Fam- 
ilies Churchmen, and 150 to 170 Families Congregational- 
ists, the rest Quakers and Nothings, There is no Episcopal 
Church, one Quaker Meeting, only one Congregational of 
which Mr. Shaw is Pastor." 

21 



September Days on Nantucket 

lashes to Palpus (now known as Polpis), 
attracted by its house of entertainment 
which stood near the shore of the upper 
harbor, three or four miles from town. 
There, says a traveler who visited Nan- 
tucket in the latter part of the eighteenth 
century, they have the pleasure of " throw- 
ing the bar, of heaving stones," etc. He 
also says : " By resorting to that place they 
enjoy a change of air, they taste the plea- 
sures of exercise ; perhaps an exhilarating 
bowl, not at all improper in this climate. 
I was once invited to that house, and had 
the satisfaction of conducting thither one 
of the many beauties of the island (for it 
abounds with handsome women) dressed 
in all the bewitching attire of the most 
charming simplicity ; like the rest of the 
company she was cheerful without loud 
laughs, and smiling without affectation. 
I had never before in my life seen so 
much unaffected mirth mixed with so 
much modesty. The pleasures of the day 

22 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

were enjoyed with the greatest liveliness 
and the most innocent freedom, without 
a fiddle, or a dance. We returned as 
happy as we went, and the brightness of 
the moon kindly lengthened a day which 
had passed with singular rapidity." 

Women, whose husbands and lovers 
were at sea, became naturally interested in 
marine matters and in the details of voy- 
ages. At neighborhood gatherings they 
were entertained by stories of adventure 
or descriptions of strange lands and peo- 
ple, which young men narrated after their 
return from sea. One tells of a tropical 
island inhabited only by men ; never was 
a woman permitted to land on it. He 
tells how happy he feels that it is not so 
on their own island, and says there are no 
girls so lovely as the girls of Nantucket. 
If we may trust the opinion of travelers, 
they were not like the " nice " girls of 
modern novelists, who are described in the 
nursery jingle as made of " sugar and spice 
23 



September Days on Nantucket 

and all that 's nice ; " there was in the typi- 
cal Nantucket girl a robustness of charac- 
ter, a gentle independence, an out-of-door 
freshness, which contrasted sharply with 
the sober mannerisms that surrounded her, 
through which she occasionally broke, as 
the island roses broke through garden 
fences. 

There were visits to the Market Place, 
which, like a London Coffee House of the 
olden time, was a place to meet acquaint- 
ances, also to hear what news had come 
from ships at sea, to make bargains, to 
learn the price of oil in Boston, and what 
was going on in the town. In this mar- 
ket there were dealings for shares in whal- 
ing voyages; some of these are recorded 
in the book of George Gardner, who had 
retired from the quarter-deck of a whale- 
ship to the armchair of a justice of the 
peace. For example : — 

"Nantucket lo October, 1775. For 
thirteen pounds six shillings lawful money 
24 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

to me in hand paid by William Coffin, 
perukemaker, I do bargain and sell to 
him the whole of my voyage which I shall 
obtain on board the brigantine Beaver, 
Hezekiah Coffin master, bound to the 
coast of Brazil or elsewhere. — Alexander 
Hay." 

"Nantucket 28 October, 1775. For 
thirty-six shillings lawful money to me in 
hand paid by William Coffin peruke- 
maker I do bargain and sell to him the 
one-eighth part of my voyage which I 
shall obtain on board the brigantine Bea- 
ver, Capt. Hezekiah Coffin bound to the 
Brazils or elsewhere. — Ebenezer Doane." 

In the Market Place were posted the 
arrival of vessels at the port and their 
departure. For example : — 

"July 1st, 1782. Robert Spencer mas- 
ter of sloop Nancy, burthen 18 tons, navi- 
gated with 2 men, mounted with no guns, 
has permission to depart from this port 
with 300 of Beef for Swanzey. 

25 



September Days on Nantucket 

"December 2oth, 1782. Reuben Macy 
master of brigantine Desire, 130 tons, has 
permission to take on board a cargo of 
Oyl for Ostend. 

" February 1 st, 1 783. Christopher Gard- 
ner master of the sloop Fox, 30 tons, nav- 
igated with four men has permission to 
depart for Surinam with 17 casks To- 
bacco, 70 Quintals Fish, 7 casks Oyl, 7 
boxes Sperm Candles, 125 Shooks, 600 
of Heading, 4 barrels Tar, Some Oars, 
1 bbl Pickel Fish. 

"February 25th, 1783. James Bartlett 
master of the schooner Hamilton, 15 tons 
burthen, has arrived from Machias with 
240 bushels Salt, 4 bbls Oyl, 2 casks Sam- 
mon, 1 box Pipes, 4 reams Paper, 40 wt 
Tea, 70 wt Pepper, 1000 Boards. 

"May 31st, 1783. William Moores, 
master of ship Bedford, has arrived from 
London." 

All these things, trifling as they may 
appear to-day, were of some importance 
26 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

to the women who were representing a 
majority of the inhabitants of the island ; 
but they were not sufficient to destroy the 
monotony of their social life, caused by 
the absence of men at sea and the pro- 
hibition of enjoyments in music and dan- 
cing. The " opium habit " was a natural 
result. The visitor to Nantucket, whom 
we have already quoted as a guest at Pal- 
pus, says : " A singular custom prevails 
here among the women at which I was 
greatly surprised. They have adopted 
these many years the Asiatic custom of 
taking a dose of opium every morning, 
and so deeply rooted is it that they would 
be at a loss how to live without this indul- 
gence ; they would rather be deprived of 
any necessary than forego their favorite 
luxury." 

The influences of the Revolution caused 
a change to come over the orderly char- 
acter of Nantucket, and a degeneracy in 
the quality of its social life. Taxes had 
27 



September Days on Nantucket 

been paid for the support of schools and 
the poor ; but not a penny had ever been 
levied to maintain a police force, or to 
light the streets at night ; and the Quaker 
inhabitants had no intention to change 
their parsimonious economy. The con- 
sequence was that tumultuous assemblies 
and riotous acts were of frequent occur- 
rence, with a disregard of private rights 
such as is likely to prevail in any seaport 
town when there is no police force to pre- 
serve order. Two instances recorded by 
a Justice of the Peace illustrate the law- 
lessness of the town : — 

"February 14th, 1783. George Gracie 
a Merchant entered Complaint against 
one John Bean a Merchant for insulting 
& threatening to take his Life. Upon 
examination pleads Guilty. Judgment is 
that s^ John Bean find sureties to keep 
the Peace & pay Cost of Court & be 
committed till Judgment is perform'd. 
Costs 15/5." 

28 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

"August 23d, 1783. Obed Hussey 
Esq*"^ complained of Aaron Ralph an In- 
dian for assaulting & striking him. Judg- 
ment is that s"* Aaron pay a fine of 10 
shillings or be whipt on his Naked Back 
10 stripes, pay Cost of Court & be com- 
mitted till Judgment is perform'd. Cost 

A letter written from Nantucket to a 
Boston weekly journal of the year 1820, re- 
ferring to those times, said : " Our wharves 
and streets exhibited groups of riotous 
boys, and even the yards and porches of 
our sanctuaries were profaned by their 
clamors in time of Divine service." 

This condition of affairs, with the infer- 
tility of the soil of the island, its inclem- 
ent winters, the superior facilities for 
prosecuting the whaling business offered 
by the deep water harbor of New Bedford, 
were motives which caused several fami- 
lies to remove from the island before the 
end of the century. Some went to New 
29 



September Days on Nantucket 

Garden in North Carolina, a settlement be- 
gun before the Revolution by a few mem- 
bers of the Quaker Society who had been 
attracted thither by reports of a fertile 
land and a mild climate. Laban Mitchell, 
a minister of the Society, visited the 
homesick exiles at New Garden ; and in 
a letter written to Mary Barker, of Nan- 
tucket, he said : " We seem to be more 
than a thousand miles from our beloved 
island, yet the regard I have for some 
there is not abated, of which number thou 
art one. I was like a traveller in a Wil- 
derness when passing thro' Virginia where 
Friends had almost deserted their meet- 
ings. We had to stop at Public Houses 
& be waited upon by slaves, sometimes 
in log Houses with no windows & no 
floor, nor separate apartments, tho' the 
People were very kind and thanked us 
for our company. We are now at New 
Garden where our Unkles & Aunts, Cou- 
sins & Nantucket friends are. We are 
30 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

viewing them in their Houses & partak- 
ing with them of the good of their land. 
We are attending their Meetings almost 
daily. We have the company of Chris- 
topher Anthony who has travelled much 
in the Ministry. He told me to tell the 
women that he had seen the close trial 
they had been brought into leaving home. 
The weather here is quite as cold as it 
was last winter at Nantucket." 

Charity Rodman, 23 years of age, writ- 
ing to her sister Anna Hazard, relates the 
news, gives a sketch of home life, refers to 
a change of social conditions in Nantucket, 
and expresses a hope of removal to New 
Bedford. As there was no public mail to 
and from the island, letters were held by 
the writers until an acquaintance or the 
captain of a packet was to depart for the 
place to which they were addressed. This 
letter is superscribed, "favored by David 
Anthony." ^ 

1 The Rodman family of Nantucket was descended 
31 



September Days on Nantucket 

Nantucket, 2nd mo. 22nd day, lySo* 
I am now about performing an inten- 
tion that has for some time been mine of 
giving thee, my beloved sister, a daily- 
sketch of our transactions, such I mean as 
are worth notice or render' d so by the inter- 
ested part we take in them. I think it 
will not be unpleasing to thee, as there is 
scarcely any transaction however trivial 
but what conveys to the congenial mind 
a secret pleasure. The rain prevented the 
girls from going to meeting to-day ; we 
are now sitting round the table employ- 
ing the pen, which is indeed an agreea- 
ble resource when we are deprived of 
others; mama is reading the history of 

from John Rodman, a Quaker of New Ross, Wexford 
County, Ireland. Rutty' s History of the Quakers in 
Ireland, published in the year 1751, says : **In the 
year 1655, for wearing his hat in the Assizes of New 
Ross, John Rodman was committed to Gaol by the 
Judge, kept a prisoner three months, and then ban- 
ished that country." 

32 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

England. Jimmy Robinson came over in 
the packet yesterday & spent last evening 
with us. We have not now so large a num- 
ber of evening visitors as in years past; 
thou wilt naturally conclude the alteration 
is pleasing to us all since there is so little 
society in the town that can justly be num- 
ber'd with the agreeables. I have long 
thought that our happiness in that respect 
depended upon a small circle of sincere 
friends, where " heart meets heart," such 
as I hope to share if we are permitted 
to form one neighborhood & reunite our 
divided family at New Bedford. 

Nantucket, 2nd mo. 24th day. 

Yesterday was a snow storm which con- 
tinued without much ceasation till near 
twelve to-day. I began to spin tow for the 
filler of our towels ; the warp is nearly ac- 
complished. Sister Sally join'd me in the 
afternoon; but it is tedious disagreeable 
business. I don't like it. Isaac Chase spent 
33 



September Days on Nantucket 

the evening here & call'd to-day to take a 
letter to send to New Bedford. Hannah 
watched last night with Tom Dennisses 
wife who lives in the house cousin Nichols 
us'd to ; she has had a severe turn of the 
Pleurisy & is still very ill. Mama seems 
better, so well as to go about and card the 
flax for us. 

Nantuckety 2nd mo. 26th day. 

This day and yesterday too cold to spin. 
We have assisted mama in preparing the 
Carpet, sewing rags, &c. Jim Robinson 
who is yet I believe in town spent the 
afternoon here yesterday & Bill Miller 
evening before last. Perhaps thee hast 
heard me mention captain Greene, a per- 
son that Ben Dockray and R. Robinson 
have sailed with. He has lately married I 
believe a Mumford & Jim informed us 
they all dined at cousin Robinsons yester- 
day; did thee ever find such another 
family — people that they are under no 
34 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

obligation to, then to take in. Several of 
the Barkers from New York are in town. 
Tom & Abraham came a few days since 
& we hear this morning by Charles that 
the latter unfortunately fell down last even- 
ing and broke his leg badly, a sorrowful 
circumstance indeed. I can't tell in what 
situation the poor thing was; believe he was 
quite sober, but he will be hardly Judged; 
he was carried into Merchants Tavern 
& they were about trying to carry him to 
Dr. Huntinton's sometime to-day. I pity 
him sincerely, or anybody else that has 
need of Bonesetter Sweet's assistance. But 
this event tho sorrowful is not so alarm- 
ing as one that has lately took place ; day 
before yesterday Christopher EUery went 
home to drink tea after which he took a 
letter from his pocket & while reading it 
fell in a fainting fit almost into the fire & 
expired before any assistance could be pro- 
cured. The ink has several times froze in 
my pen. I dont know that thee can read 
35 



September "Days on Nantucket 

it, I am very cold, the Girls have gone to 
Meeting & I must go & clean the great 
room. Farewell my dear I wish thee every 
happiness thou canst receive. My love & 
the familys attends you all. 

thy C. R. 

Elizabeth Rotch, wife of William 
Rotch, Jr., writing to her sister Anna, 
wife of Thomas Hazard, Jr., living in 
Providence, alludes to the changed social 
condition of Nantucket, and mentions 
with the news an expectation of removing 
from the island : — 

Nantucket, 3d. mo. 26d. i^BS. 

... I imagine the Society thou asso- 
ciates with very preferable to what thy 
former situation here subjected thee to, and 
must confess the company of ones own 
connexions affords more satisfaction & real 
comfort than we can expect to find from 
any other source. Thy last letter is of so 
old a date that a reply would be quite un- 
36 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

seasonable tho the contents are very affec- 
tionate & afforded me consolation at the 
receipt ; it was at the time my dear Wil- 
liam was passing the disagreeable opera- 
tion of Small Pox which he was greatly 
favored in, & has been very healthy since 
his return home.^ We have not yet done 
anything towards removing but expect we 
shall get away some time next month. A 
melancholy account arrived here a few days 
since that a Schooner belonging to D. 
Starbuck on her passage home from Caro- 
lina was lost & all the hands perished, the 
Captain was Ruebin Coffin, Mate Jona- 
than Macy, son of old Jonathan, they have 
both left widows & little Children to 
Mourn their loss. Ephraim Congdon was 
likewise on board. The unfortunate Capt. 
Cole (belonging to Clark & Nightingales 

^ The ** Pest House," to which persons were sent 
to be passed through a course of smallpox, was situ- 
ated near the eastern shore of the harbor, within sight 
of the town. 

37 



September Days on Nantucket 

Brig) I feel much for ; he is a person of 
great sensibility & is extremely wounded 
at the circumstance, he is quite agreeable 
in his behaviour & I think improves upon 
acquaintance, that makes me the more de- 
sirous lenity should be shown him by his 
owners. . . . 

An allusion to the disagreeable change 
in the character of social life at Nantucket 
appears also in a letter of the year 1798 
from Mary Rodman to her cousin Sarah 
Hazard, living in New Bedford : — 

Nantucket, 2nd Mo., 18 th day, l^gS. 
Altho the intercourse since the receipt 
of thy very acceptable letter has been 
much interrupted, yet there has been op- 
portunity when I might have answered it 
if I cou'd have found any thing worth 
writing, and I seem to have but little at 
this time but if I cou'd see thee I shou'd 
have much to say. It is now very blus- 

38 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

tering weather and there is considerable 
Ice in the harbour, so that it 's quite un- 
certain when the packet will sail for New 
Bedford, but I hope she will soon for the 
time has nearly arriv'd that we shall ex- 
pect my dear Father, and perhaps the next 
packet may restore him to his long left 
family. Were we in New Bedford I be- 
lieve the time would pass more agreeable 
than it does here, and if we move and go 
into Matthew Howlands house it will be 
very handy to yours, which will be very 
pleasing to me. . . . 

The fourwindmills, of which the keeper 
on the hilltop was telling us this morn- 
ing, were used during the war of 1812 to 
telegraph approaching ships tliat British 
cruisers were near the island, the arms 
of the mills pointing to the direction in 
which cruisers were seen. These cruisers 
caused severe losses to Nantucket. Its 
inhabitants, when petitioning Congress, in 
39 



September Days on Nantucket 

November, 1813, for relief, said: "A 
number of our valuable ships with full 
cargoes of oil have been captured and 
totally lost; and, what is truly lamenta- 
ble, several of the owners who heretofore 
were in affluent circumstances, are now 
reduced to indigence; and we have fur- 
ther to anticipate a loss of fifteen valuable 
ships now absent in the whale fishery." 
The selectmen had stated that the popula- 
tion of the island numbered nearly seven 
thousand ; but Congress left the people to 
shift for themselves. With a famine in 
prospect, they applied to the British ad- 
miral for aid. When he learned their des- 
titute condition and peaceful intentions, he 
signed permits and passes for their vessels 
to go and fetch from New York supplies of 
firewood and provisions on condition that 
they should not share his favors with any 
of their countrymen who were in arms 
against him. The contract was faithfully 
kept ; a British frigate anchored in the bay ; 
40 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

its barges, flying white flags, entered the 
harbor and made landings at the wharves ; 
its officers walked the streets of the town 
and accepted hospitality from some of the 
principal families, which were acknow- 
ledged by entertainments aboard the ship. 
When a fight occurred near the island 
between the barges and an American pri- 
vateer, the wounded of both crews were 
brought to Nantucket, and whatever the 
people could do for them was done with- 
out any distinction between friend and 
foe. Among the wounded were two mid- 
shipmen of the frigate, who were made 
so comfortable by the family into whose 
hands they fell that they were not eager 
to recover too soon and be recalled to 
their ship. A Nantucket woman, writing 
about this incident several years after its 
occurrence, said of these young men: 
" They were permitted to enjoy social 
intercourse with the inhabitants, and ac- 
quaintances were formed by them which 
41 



September Days on Nantucket 

time and change probably did not soon 
obliterate." 

The inhabitants of Nantucket were de- 
voted to the principle of peace with all 
men, so long as the influence of the 
Quaker Society prevailed. Whenever mil- 
itary companies came to the island for a 
holiday, young women thronged windows 
and waved handkerchiefs, but there was 
no rise of military ambition in the town. 
Once a coterie of young men formed a 
training company and sent to Boston for 
equipments; but their elders compelled 
them to make the first article of their con- 
stitution to read : " This company shall be 
disbanded immediately in case of war." 

While war was destroying the whaling 
business, the people turned their attention 
to other occupations. A letter written at 
Nantucket in May, 1813, by Gideon 
Gardner to his sister Mary, living in 
Rhode Island, says: "Not having any- 
thing to do, the fashion of business has 
42 



Old Windmills and Toung Women 

altered. All have turned farmers except 
a few who have purchased small vessels 
to bring provisions from New York. Gil 
Swain & Dan Hussey arrived a few days 
ago with Flour & Corn. Others are gone 
& going. Flour is 14 to $15. Corn 1.50. 
I fear many will have no money to buy 
with. The season is more forward than 
last year, and the grass bids fair for a good 
hay crop. I never had my gardens look 
so well as they do now. I have done much 
work on them myself, so much that my 
hand writes stiffly. The Brig Ocean, Capt. 
Absolam Coffin, has been captured and 
carried to the Cape of Good Hope. No 
news from any of our Cape Horn ships. 
It would be pleasing to me to have a 
brisk subject to make my letter upon, viz 
— a speedy prospect of Peace, and our 
whale ships returning with good voyages, 
but we must be content with our Fate and 
make the best of it." 

During the summer of 1815, when 
43 



September 'Days on Nantucket 

peace had returned, two lively young 
women from Liverpool, Nova Scotia, 
voyaging to New York, tarried at Nan- 
tucket. A letter written by one of them 
contains their opinions of the town and 
people. The writer of it had apparently 
been sitting in a corner and sighing, like 
Beatrice in the play, " Heigho for a hus- 
band ! " In her eyes the men whom she 
met on the island were " good looking," 
the women " uncommonly homely." 

Nantuckety August 25/^, 181^- 

Friday Morning, Nine O' Clock. 

Here we are, my dear Frances, — in 
the Library of a Presbyterian Minister at 
Mrs. Careys in Nantucket where we are 
very pleasantly situated, after an uncom- 
mon fine passage with very little Sea 
Sickness. On Wednesday afternoon we 
found ourselves alongside the Long- 
Wharf, and were astonished to see it lined 
with persons of all descriptions waiting I 
44 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

suppose the appearance of the Nova Sco- 
tia Ladies at their landing. While we 
were preparing to debark our good Cap- 
tain came below with information that a 
chaise would be ready in a few moments 
to take us to Lodgings. Accordingly in 
about ten minutes the ratling of wheels 
announced its approach and in a moment 
after the Capt. appeared at the Cabin door 
and presented a Young Gentleman hand- 
somely dressed of a fine countenance and 
genteel and pleasing address. Judge of 
our Surprise when the name of Mitchell 
was announced, for it was no other than 
the very Mr. Aaron Mitchell to whom 
Mr. G. gave us the Letter. Oh ! my 
Dear Girl I protest my Heart has received 
a shock of which it will not easily recover, 
for Alas ! he is — married. But to return. 
We immediately followed our Conductor 
on deck and found his own chaise and ser- 
vant into which we were politely handed 
by Mr. M. and another Gentleman with 
45 



September Days on Nantucket 

whose name I am unacquainted. We 
drove up the Wharf and through several 
streets and was at length set down at our 
present Lodgings where we found a kind 
little Woman ready to pay us every at- 
tention. Our only companion is the Min- 
ister before mentioned who is a young 
Man about thirty ; a lucky circumstance 
you will say for our Lady Matron — as 
you are well acquainted with her partiality 
for Gentlemen of that cloth. Our Land- 
lady informs us he is quite studious and 
his countenance confirms her assertion. 

This Place far exceeds any idea I had 
ever formed of it. The number of Inhab- 
itants amount to about Eight thousand, 
and there is supposed to be Seven Hun- 
dred Men now employed in the Whale 
Fisherys. There are two Meeting Houses 
for the Friends, two Congregationalist, 
one Presbyterian, and one Methodist. 
As we have learnt the Packet will not 
sail for New York until Monday I shall 
46 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

be able to give you a more particular ac- 
count than woulc^ otherwise have been in 
my power. Adieu then, until afternoon 
when I hope to resume my pen and 
communicate something more concerning 
our Charming Aaron Mitchell, As we are 
momentarily expecting a visit from him. 

Friday afternooUy Four O' Clock. 

Our Friend Mr. M. has not made his 
appearance. He is undoubtedly engaged 
in attending to the discharge of the Flora's 
Cargo being a party concerned but I hope 
we may be more fortunate tomorrow. We 
have just returned from a walk through 
the South part of the Town in which 
Mrs. Carey accompanied us. The streets 
in some parts are narrow but the Houses 
generally have an appearance of neatness 
and comfort. Mr. Mitchells House is the 
most elegant brick House in Town. The 
soil is of sand, which renders walking 
quite a fatigueing exercise. But I think 
47 



September 'Days on Nantucket 

riding must be very pleasant. During 
our walk I in vain looked for Rocks and 
really felt quite disappointed at not dis- 
covering those Ornaments of my dear 
native soil. I am just summoned to Tea 
after which I will again inform you of all 
that occurs during our stay. 

Saturday Morningy Ten O'clock. 

After I descended last evening to tea 
as we were chatting with our good Land- 
lady a Gentleman entered the Room of a 
very pleasing appearance. He soon en- 
tered into conversation at once easey and 
polite, and before we parted for the night 
we were all equally delighted and some 
half in Love with him. He appeared 
equally Good and Amiable. It is not 
in my power to mention the Variety of 
Subjects on which he converses with the 
greatest fluency, but they were all calcu- 
lated to improve and delight us. On 
enquiry we have learnt he is a native of 
48 



Old Windmills and Toung Women 

Scotland but now residing at Schenactady 
in the State of New York, Consequently 
we shall be favoured with his company 
in our passage to that City. He appears 
about thirty-six years, of a good figure and 
very pleasing manners, and of the most 
extensive information of any Gentleman 
I have ever seen. His name is Mr. Cul- 
ler and is a Lawyer by profession. Oh! 
my dear Frances why are we not favoured 
with (at least) One or Two such Gen- 
tlemen? What an invaluable privilege 
would their Society afford us. You may 
perhaps be surprised at my not having 
said more of our minister. But to say the 
truth he is very much enamoured of his 
Books. He keeps an Academy for the 
Instruction of the Youth of both Sexes 
and only preaches occasionally. 

Sunday Noorty August 2yth, l8l^* 

Just returned from Church where we 
were attended by our Two Gentlemen 
49 



September Days on Nantucket 

Mr. Culler and Mr. Pierce, the former be- 
comes every day and hour more interest- 
ing and the latter is much more agreeable. 
The Minister gave us a Sermon about 
twenty minutes long, rather dry, his name 
is Swift and appears quite young. The 
House is large but not much crowded. 
The Singing was very indifferent; they 
have a handsome clock in front of the 
Gallery in which I saw no person except 
the singers. The Ladies here are all un- 
commonly Homely and Ungenteel. There 
are some tolerably good looking Gentle- 
men, tho not many of them. We shall not 
go out again this afternoon as Charlotte 
has the tooth ache and it is quite warm. 

We are at present in a very unsettled 
manner with respect to writing being 
obliged to borrow Ink from the Minister 
in whose Library I am now writing. Don*t 
fail to write me all the little occurrences 
that may transpire during my absence. 
Ever yours, Mary Ann Hopkins. 

50 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

The growth of Nantucket after the war 
of 1812, and an increase in its population 
by the coming of new residents who were 
not Quakers, did not reduce the disparity 
in numbers between the women and the 
men, which was then as four to one. 
When, in June, 1834, a Congregational 
meeting-house was dedicated, the Rev. 
Thomas Robbins, of Mattapoisett, who 
officiated at the ceremony, wrote in his 
diary : " About four-fifths of the members 
of this church are females, and a part of 
the men are at sea." A minister of the 
town spoke of a shipmaster who, out of 
his forty-one years, had spent thirty-four 
years on the ocean. This remark caused 
a woman to say : " I have been married 
eleven years, and all the times my hus- 
band has been at home since our marriage 
amount to three hundred and sixty days. 
He has been gone on his present voyage 
fifteen months; two years must elapse 
before he can return, and when he comes 
51 



September Days on Nantucket 

home it will be a visit of a few months; 
then he will sail again on a four years' 
cruise." 

She was asked how many letters she 
wrote to her husband during his last 
voyage. 

She replied : " I know the value of let- 
ters ; they are cool water to a thirsty soul. 
I wrote a hundred. I wrote by every 
ship bound to the Pacific Ocean from 
Nantucket and New Bedford. But he 
did n't receive all my letters. Some were 
brought back after he had sailed on his 
present voyage." 

About this time there was a bookstore 
in the town advertising Frederika Bremer's 
" celebrated novels translated by a lady of 
Boston," a "Pictorial Life of Napoleon," 
Audubon's " Birds of America," in num- 
bers, " Women of England," by Mrs. Ellis, 
and other books now long out of vogue ; 
and there was what may have been a cir- 



52 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

culating library, announced in these words : 
" To let, five hundred interesting books, 
sui generis." There were also stores adver- 
tising beaver and moleskin hats ; *' a first 
rate tailor prepared to make clothes to fit 
and to suit ; " " metalic wigs, metalic tou- 
pers and all kinds of goods usually found 
at hairdressers ; " aromatic snufF, of which 
the buyer is assured that " after a long 
day's work a pinch will be extremely grate- 
ful ; " Leghorn bonnets, and the latest fash- 
ions from New York ; " great bargains 
and low prices." At last there came from 
Boston a cab ; attention was called to it 
by an advertisement in the Nantucket 
semiweekly newspaper of the year 1843, 
by which the importer " respectfully in- 
forms the citizens of Nantucket that he 
has just procured an elegant Cab to which 
he will attach a steady horse and hold 
them in readiness at all hours of the day 
or night. By strict attention to the wishes 



53 



September Days on Nantucket 

of patrons, careful driving, and moderate 
prices he hopes to receive due encourage- 
ment." 

This solitary vehicle was noticed by a 
Boston newspaper correspondent of July, 
1852, who, when enumerating the carriage 
conveniences of the town, mentioned " one 
cab at least." 

The appearance of the town at this time 
may be described as unattractive. Nearly 
all the dwelling-houses were of wood, un- 
painted, without piazzas and ornaments; 
but more comfortable within than they 
appeared to be to an observer without. 
Connected with them were gardens which 
produced abundant growths of vegetables, 
currants, strawberries, gooseberries, grapes, 
and quinces. Fruit trees could not with- 
stand the salty atmosphere and furious 
winds of winter, which sometimes crept 
in so mildly that garden flowers bloomed 
in December, and at other times came 
with storms and ice floes, preventing com- 
54 



Old Windmills and Toung Women 

munications with the mainland. There 
were a few double dwelling-houses, built 
of brick, containing twelve rooms, but the 
value of real estate was so low that the 
yearly rent of such houses did not exceed 
one hundred and fifty dollars, and any 
two-story wooden house in the best part 
of the town could be rented for seventy- 
five dollars. Waiting for guests stood the 
old-fashioned tavern with its comfortable 
porch, its tall gate-posts supporting the 
jawbone of a whale, its yard gay with 
hollyhocks in summer time. Only the prin- 
cipal streets were paved ; others were the 
same sandy lanes as of yore, and all were 
destitute of trees excepting here and there 
a solitary willow, or horse-chestnut, or sil- 
ver-leaf poplar. Thrice a week the slug- 
gish steamboat Massachusetts, Captain Lot 
Phinney, departed for New Bedford, and 
returned on the intermediate days, wind 
and weather permitting. Alongside one 
of the decaying wharves were the remains 
55 



September Days on Nantucket 

of the old marine camels which, in former 
years, lifted up the freighted ships bound 
from Nantucket to distant seas, and floated 
them over the harbor bar. The town in 
all its parts seemed to be waiting for that 
new birth which came at last with the 
summer throng. But the inhabitants had 
their own resources of pleasure. As Quak- 
erism had lost its influence, and other 
religious sects had taken its place, there 
were dances and musical concerts, literary- 
clubs, sewing bees, whist parties, and house 
parties, under the management of wo- 
men who were in fact the rulers of the 
town. 

Many accounts given by travelers of 
their visits to Nantucket mention the 
beauty of the women of the island. 
Their beauty and their intellectual qual- 
ity are referred to in a letter written by an 
islander, and published in a New York 
newspaper so recently as the year i8_5'3. 
It says : " As there is a great preponder- 
56 



Old Windmills and Toung Women 

ance of numbers in the female popula- 
tion here, they enjoy great freedom and 
independence and are on the average 
superior to the men in intellectual culture ; 
moreover they have no lack of physical 
beauty." 

Beautiful women have the right to rank 
as historical personages; but those of 
Nantucket appear to have escaped the 
historian's pen until the Governor of Mas- 
sachusetts came to the island in the au- 
tumn of 1825, bringing with him, as his 
aide-de-camp, a diarist. In those days a 
Governor was an unusual guest ; no such 
dignitary had previously landed on Nan- 
tucket. He was brought ashore from the 
packet sloop in a whaleboat, and was cor- 
dially received by many of the principal 
citizens, who had assembled for that pur- 
pose. After the reception they escorted 
him to " the barber-shop " to inspect a 
collection of South Sea curiosities of which 
the barber was custodian. Barber-shops 
57 



September Days on Nantucket 

were central places of resort in New Eng- 
land towns; a writer of the year 1817, 
who was interested in what are now called 
Mayflower Relics, speaks of "sitting in 
Gov. Carver's armchair in the barber-shop 
at Plymouth." "Then," says the diarist, 
"came visits to the whaleships and the 
spermacitti works, dinners, and evening 
receptions, the latter being graced by the 
presence of very pretty young women." 
Saturday morning the visitors were jolted 
to Siasconset in horse-carts to eat a chow- 
der; and on Saturday evening an enter- 
tainment was arranged for the Governor 
and his companions by Aaron Mitchell 
in his elegant mansion on North Water 
Street, corner of Sea Street, which, with its 
large greenhouses and gardens, was the 
richest homestead in the town. 

This entertainment, without music and 
dancing of course, was said to be "the 
finest in all its appointments that the is- 
land had ever known." The aide-de- 
58 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

camp was there, and he wrote in his diary : 
"The number of beautiful and lively 
young women impressed me as exceed- 
ing anything that could be looked for in 
a similar gathering upon the mainland, 
and filled me with regrets that we were to 
sail at daybreak. I was expressing my 
feelings in this particular to a bright bevy 
of these girls when Hezekiah Barnard 
suddenly joined our group and put in this 
remark : ' Friend, if thou wishest to stay 
on the island thou hast only to persuade 
one of these young women to put a black 
cat under a tub and surely there would 
be a head wind to-morrow.' The young 
ladies united in declaring there was not 
a black cat in all Nantucket, they having 
been smothered to detain husbands and 
brothers bound for the southern seas. At 
last Miss Baxter, the prettiest girl in the 
room, confessed to the possession of a 
black kitten. But would this do ? A ma- 
ture cat, perhaps two, would be required 
59 



September Days on Nantucket 

to keep a governor from sailing; but an 
aide-de-camp could certainly be kept back 
by a kitten, and Miss Baxter had only to 
dismiss the governor and concentrate her 
thoughts upon me and the charm would 
work." 

Next morning the young man was 
called up by his host, Barker Burnell, with 
the words, " Wind dead ahead ! " As he 
could not leave the island, and it was Sun- 
day, he went to the Quaker Meeting. He 
sat there nearly an hour in absolute silence, 
as did the entire assembly ; and the silence 
seemed to him to be favorable for reflec- 
tion and devotional feeling, until two 
women, who supposed themselves to be 
"moved by the Spirit," arose and ad- 
dressed the meeting. Then, as he said, 
his feelings underwent a quick revulsion. 

Was Miss Baxter there ? 

The young man's diary does not tell. 

He sailed away on Monday morning. 
As he became a distinguished citizen 
60 



Old Windmills and Young Women 

of Boston, the story of his evening with 
Nantucket girls offers a fair scope for those 
who, like Maud Muller arid the judge, are 
fond of ruminating on the " might have 
been." 



6i 



Old Houses and Ghosts 



<s 



Old Houses and Ghosts 

I This sunny forenoon we 
WCJiOS'p ( went to examine an old 
THIRD DAY \ house which is said to be 
the oldest house on the island. Jethro Cof- 
fin built it in the year 1686, when he was 
twenty-three years old and had just mar- 
ried Mary Gardner, a child of sixteen years. 
He braced the frame of the house with 
ship knees so that winter gales should not 
sag it, and he built on the face of its chim- 
ney a brick device in the shape of a horse- 
shoe, so that good luck should come to it. 
But this token has not saved the house 
from " decay's effacing fingers." It stands 
dilapidated and solitary in a grassy field, — 

<* Blistering in the sun, without a tree or vine 
To cast the tremulous shadow of its leaves 
Across the curtainless windows ; " — 

6s 



September Days on Nantucket 

and in all its details it reveals the hard 
features of a time when men and women 
were so poor that they were compelled to 
earn their living by continuous labor. The 
house is empty, like the abandoned shell 
of the chambered nautilus ; those who lived 
in it having left long ago their "low- 
vaulted past" to build homes in some 
wider sphere of life than any that existed 
on Nantucket. 

As a specimen of a dwelling-house in 
colonial times it is uninteresting. It is 
partly in ruins, it is small, ungainly in pro- 
portions, and hardly worth the attention 
given to it. In Massachusetts there are 
more than fifty old colonial dwelling- 
houses which are interesting in architec- 
tural designs and historical associations, 
and some are now the homes of descend- 
ants of the men who built them. Of such 
old houses the Whittier homestead near 
Haverhill may be mentioned as a perfect 
memorial of colonial home life ; the birth- 
66 



Old Houses and Ghosts 

place of him who was by excellence the 
poet laureate of New England, and the 
scene of his famous " Snow-Bound." 
The visitor enters the same "old, rude- 
furnished room " whose whitewashed walls 

** Burst flower-like into rosy bloom " — 

when they caught the first gleam of the 
evening's fire on the andirons. The chairs 
are there in which the persons described in 
the poem sat during that winter night, and 
above " the great throat of the chimney " 
still hangs "the bulPs-eyed watch" that 

*< Pointed, with mutely warning sign. 
Its black hand to the hour of nine. ' ' 

As an object to be visited and studied, 
such colonial houses are more valuable 
than those of inferior type, like the Nan- 
tucket house, — 

** Where all day long no voice is ever heard 
To stir the spider in his endless care. 
Where through the night no footsteps ever pass 
Over the splintered floor or creaking stair.'* 

67 



September Days on Nantucket 

Nevertheless, as one of the few curiosities 
which the islanders have to show, it re- 
ceives many visits from summer people. 
They notice a little opening close to the 
front door, a peephole through which per- 
sons within the house inspected those who 
knocked on the door for admission ; it was 
especially useful to ascertain if an Indian 
caller was drunk, for drunkenness was the 
usual condition of the Indian population 
of Nantucket. The front door opens into 
a small space. On the right hand and on 
the left are doors leading into large rooms ; 
and over these in the second story are two 
similar rooms, reached by winding stairs 
supported against the chimney around 
which the house was built. The ceilings 
are low, the frame-posts are in sight, and 
the fireplaces are wide enough to receive 
cordwood in its full length. 

Some country houses of the seven- 
teenth century contained secret closets and 
haunted rooms, as described in the ghost 
68 



Old Houses and Ghosts 

story told by Tennyson, based on a legend 
related by James Russell Lowell of a 
house, near the place where he lived, which 
was vexed by — 

** A footstep, a low throbbing in the walls, 
A noise of falling weights that never fell. 
Weird whispers, bells that rang without a hand. 
Door-handles turned when none was at the door. 
And bolted doors that opened of themselves. ' * 

Everybody who has a lingering love for 
the marvelous likes to see these places. 
Behind the chimney of Jethro's house was 
a secret closet which has a story to tell. 
One day when he was absent, and his wife 
and baby were spending an afternoon with 
a neighbor, a drunken Indian entered the 
house, ascended to the garret, and there 
fell asleep. At midnight he awoke, and 
while moving about in the dark garret the 
floor opened and he dropped into the 
closet below. He crept out into an adjoin- 
ing room and began to sharpen his knife 
on the hearthstones. Mrs. Jethro was 
69 



September Days on Nantucket 

awakened by the strange noises, and seiz- 
ing her babe she fled across the fields to 
her father's house pursued by the Indian ; 
but as nothing tragical occurred, the story 
is not so thrilling as it should be. 

If it is true, as Longfellow has said, that 
" all houses in which men have lived and 
died are haunted houses," it is also true 
that the sound of a knife whetted on a 
hearthstone may be heard at midnight in 
this ghostly abode of the past. 

After going through the barren rooms 
of this house, up and down the foot- worn 
stairs, into the chilly chamber where an 
old fourpost bedstead gives to the garru- 
lous attendant authority to say that here 
was the boudoir of a bride more than two 
hundred years ago, it was a relief to get 
out into the fresh air of a glorious Sep- 
tember day. We sat down on a grassy 
slope behind the old house, and turned 
our thoughts away from the narrow and 



70 



Old Houses and Ghosts 

cheerless life which it represents to the 
wider and brighter life that now is. 

There is another old house in the town, 
but it is not shown to visitors. Long ago 
it was a Quaker meeting-house ; and some 
time after Quakerism had dissolved into 
thin air, it was moved to a foundation on 
the sand behind Brant Point Light ; facing 
the harbor on one side and the bay on the 
other, making a trifling blemish on the 
landscape. Here it had its day of glory 
as a summer hotel. We stood on the 
decayed floor of its piazza and looked 
through the uncurtained and broken win- 
dows. On the office counter we saw the 
register book ; it was open; an inkstand, 
a water pitcher, and tumbler stood near it 
We fancied that a guest had just arrived, 
registered his name, drunk a tumbler of 
ice water, and gone upstairs with the office 
clerk to show him the way to his chamber. 
We looked into the dining-room; we saw 



71 



September Days on Nantucket 

the tables and chairs that were once occu- 
pied by summer guests; there were the 
decanters, goblets, and napkins ; but no 
life nor sound. It appeared as if the house 
had been hastily abandoned; that the 
ghosts of those smooth-faced, solemn-faced 
men who, seventy years ago, were speak- 
ing in it as " moved by the spirit," had 
suddenly come in and driven out the dese- 
crators of their ancient sanctuary. 



72 



Sia scon set and 

Sea TVorshipers 



Siasconset and Sea JVorshipers 



m. 



< This morning, in 
e&nejSDa^ < a red-wheeled, rub- 
FOURTH DAY \ ber-tired, runabout 
wagon, we started to make our first journey 
on the island. Leaving the town, we en- 
tered upon a straight, hard, smooth high- 
way, recently built to replace the sandy 
way which, for more than a century, was 
one of the cart tracks leading to Siascon- 
set. On each side of the road are vast 
fields of rolling land, treeless, unfenced, 
uncultivated, and yet the greenest fields 
that we had seen for many a day. Out of 
a thicket ran a bevy of quails, crossing the 
road in front of our horse and showing 
no fear, as if the mother of the flock had 
never seen a gunner. In the southern dis- 
tance we noticed the abandoned buildings 
. 75 



September Days on Nantucket 

of a modem farming experiment, and be- 
yond them we caught glimpses of the 
ocean. As we approached the end of the 
road, which is about eight miles long, 
we met a few travelers going to the town, 
we passed a golf-club house, and a wireless 
telegraph station which communicates with 
the Nantucket Shoals lightship, anchored 
below the southeastern horizon and forty- 
one miles distant from the island. Then 
we entered a sleepy village of one town- 
pump, two hotels, and many inexpensive 
cottages, which, during the summer sea- 
son, are inhabited by families from all 
parts of the mainland. Cottages stand 
along the edges of lanes and byways which 
are called streets, and in open fields, and 
are clustered on elevations that overlook 
the sea. 

Some of the small houses built long 
ago for the use of fishermen in the fishing 
seasons are also occupied by summer peo- 
ple. These are of one low story covered 

76 



Siasconset and Sea Worshipers 

by a broad roof, with queerly shaped ex- 
tensions and conspicuous chimneys; for 
fishermen need large fires in winter when 
gales are howling over the island and 
Siasconset is pelted with snow. Land 
speculation was once rife along this fishing 
shore ; customers for lots and cottages were 
cried for in New York and Boston as if 
this section of the island had been proved 
to be a paradise for mankind. New loca- 
tions were laid out and given meaningless 
names that indicate a poverty in nomen- 
clature not to be expected of people who 
enjoy life at the seaside. The ancient 
name Siasconset is locally appropriate ; 
but it seems to be a violation of what 
Fielding called " the eternal fitness of 
things " to give the name Broadway to a 
silent, sandy, and grassy thoroughfare; 
and the name Sunset Heights to a section 
of land facing the east, while the sun 
continues to set in the west. Some of 
the cottages, so called, resemble comfort- 

n 



September Days on Nantucket 

able shanties, good enough for a vacation, 
and some stand so near to others that the 
occupants may occasionally hear from all 
around that pathetic plaint described by 
Wordsworth : — 

" An infant crying in the night ; 
An infent crying for the light ; 
And with no language but a cry.'* 

The attraction of Siasconset is a long, 
wide, sandy beach sloping up landward 
so far that its bluffs are beyond reach of 
an ordinary surf The beach faces the 
rising sun, and on fair summer days little 
awnings are stretched over it and par- 
asols are blooming on it like poppies. 
Under their shades lie the leisure-seeking 
people who live in the hotels and cot- 
tages. There they were when we arrived, 
lying on their backs along the sloping 
sands, motionless and silent as those only 
can be who are enjoying contentment and 
satisfaction of soul. There they were — 
matrons and maids, young men and gray- 
78 



Siasconset and Sea Worshipers 

haired men, and even the sleeping babe to 
whom its mother sings : — 

«* When my little son is born, on a sunny summer 

morn, 
I '11 take him sleepin' in my arms, to wake beside 

the sea; 
For the windy waters blue would be dancin' if they 

knew. 
And the weary waves, that wet the sand, come 

creepin' up to me/' 

We hitched our horse to a fence, and 
hastened down the beach, to join the pros- 
trate throng of worshipers of the sea. 

Very different will be the scene when 
all the summer people have gone. Fish- 
ermen will move into their old houses, 
send their children to the village school, 
and renew the occupation of cod fishing 
which they suspended when summer be- 
gan. They will land their fish on the 
beach, where summer people were wor- 
shiping the sea ; townspeople will occupy 
the cottages that they leased during the 
79 



September Days on Nantucket 

summer ; savory odors of fried fish and 
chowders will be afloat in the air, and the 
homespun season of Siasconset will bloom 
until Jack Frost comes to spend the win- 
ter with the fishermen. 

The habits and customs of those who 
live at Siasconset in summer are somewhat 
independent of forms and ceremonies. 
Sleeplessness is unknown. Gayety devel- 
ops itself occasionally in a dance at the 
village casino; but as gayety does not 
harmonize with repose, there is probably 
no more of it now than there was a hun- 
dred years ago, when Thomas Coffin, who 
kept a home of entertainment on the bluff, 
was " set aside," or expelled from the 
Quaker society of Nantucket, " for allow- 
ing a company of young people to dance 
in his house at Siasconset." 

" When I went to Siasconset some years 

ago," said my comrade, "there was no 

ocean to be seen. I rode across the dreary 

moorland in a covered wagon, and through 

80 



Stasconset and Sea Worshipers 

a dense fog, the driver tooting his way 
along the road with a fishhorn, as if he 
were in danger of collision with some 
vehicle. As we neared the village, he 
blew his horn with more energetic toots, 
summoning the villagers to hurry out to 
the roadside and take the packages that 
he was bringing to them from town. I 
asked him to let me blow his horn; my 
blasts were so feeble that he chuckled at 
my efforts. When I reached the village, 
the fog covered the ocean. I was landed 
at a small hotel where I took supper, and 
as the landlady had no vacant room, I was 
sent in charge of a guide to one of the 
fishermen's houses to lodge. Walking 
through narrow lanes in the fog, we came 
suddenly upon what appeared to be a tall 
woman draped in white, standing in a yard. 

"'What is that?' I asked. 

"'That's Wooden Martha,' said the 
guide, ' figurehead of a ship wrecked on 
the Shoals.' 

8i 



September Days on Nantucket 

" Near by was the house to which I had 
been directed. The owner of it, a tall fish- 
erman, received me as he stood at the door 
in blue home-knit stockings; the sleeves 
of his flannel shirt were rolled up above the 
elbows, and by way of apology he told me 
that he always ' rolled 'em up in June and 
rolled 'em down in October.' The door 
opened into the living-room, where his wife, 
a motherly-looking woman, was seated be- 
fore a small fire on the hearthstone. I was 
glad to join her, for the night was damp 
and chilly. She showed me to a little bed- 
room, its roof sloping down to two half 
windows, its feather bed piled up with com- 
fortables. I asked the man what there was 
to be seen in the village. He replied : 
'Well, if you want to see some curious 
things, they've got an old clock and a splen- 
did silver castor and Peregrine White's 
silver spoon at the post-office.' ^ He lighted 

^ The Boston News-Letter printed, in July, 1704, 
a note respecting the reputed owner of this silver 
82 



Siasconset and Sea Worshipers 

a lantern and led the way through lanes 
between houses like his own, to a captain's 
house where I saw a group of people out- 
side a window at which stood a young 
woman sorting the United States mail out- 
spread on a table. She was calling aloud 
the addresses on letters and papers, and as 
fast as her calls were answered, the mail 
matter was handed out through the win- 
dow. I found her to be an interesting per- 
son, a daughter of the captain, a- id she 
cheerfully showed me many old-feshioned 
things." 

" How many years ago ? " I ? jked. 

" Ah ! " replied my comrade/ " if I an- 
swer that, the next question will be, ' How 

spoon : <* Capt. Peregrine White, aged eighty-three 
years and eight months, died the 20th inst. He was 
vigorous and of a comly aspect to the last ; was 
born on board the Mayflower, in Cape Cod Harbor, 
November, 1620 ; was in the former part of his life 
extravagant, yet was much reformed in his last years 
and died happily." 

83 



September Days on Nantucket 

Did are you ^ ' Do you know, by the way, 
that you can ride to Siasconset in a rail- 
road car that travels the eight miles from 
tewn in forty minutes ? " 

In far away days the village attracted no 
summer residents from the mainland; its 
summer people were "the principal in- 
habitants of Nantucket." So says a letter 
written by a woman of the island in the 
year 1846, who describes the place as "a 
little fishing village a few miles from town 
called by the Indian name of Siasconset, 
the resort in summer of many of the prin- 
cipal inhabitants of Nantucket ; to them a 
perfect sans-souci, not from its elegance, 
for the hobses are small, of one story, with 
something like defiance of all rules of ar- 
chitecture. But the very circumstance of 
their smallness and simple construction 
affords freedom from care ; for who is not 
aware that there is more ease and comfort 
in the cot than in the palace, particularly 
to him who is the possessor of both ? " 
84 



Siasconset and Sea Worshipers 

In the village described by this writer 
the little houses, constructed by whimsical 
fishermen, stood on the grassy edge of a 
clifF, near to each other with backs to the 
sea. Westward the land rose to an eleva- 
tion that shut off a view across the island, 
and served (so Obed Macy wrote in the 
year 1835) "as a barrier to the cares and 
bustle of a turbulent world." The village 
was like a raree-show to newspaper writers 
who visited it. They looked at the little 
houses as children look at toys, but were 
blind to the neighboring ocean and its 
"league-long roller" thundering on the 
beach. They described Siasconset as "a 
curiosity ; " as " a little resort ; " as " one 
of the lions ; " as " a place where there is 
quite a number of funny little houses ; " 
and one who had a misty knowledge of 
the geographical situation wrote to a Bos- 
ton newspaper in the summer of 1873 : 
" Siasconset is a funny little village on the 
ocean side of the island." 
85 



September Days on Nantucket 

More appreciative than those letter- 
writers was the traveler who wrote from 
Nantucket about the year 1775, when six 
rude huts, erected for the shelter of fisher- 
men in winter, formed the Siasconset Vil- 
lage. He saw nothing that was " funny," 
but everything that was grand. He said : 
" I found the huts all empty except that 
particular one to which I had been directed. 
It was, like the others, built on the highest 
part of the shore in the face of the ocean. 
Here lived a single family without a neigh- 
bor. I had never seen a spot better calcu- 
lated to cherish contemplative ideas. The 
ever raging ocean was all that presented 
itself to the view of this family ; my eyes 
were involuntarily directed to it, my ears 
were stunned with the roar of its waves 
rolling one over the other as if impelled to 
overwhelm the spot on which I stood." 

As it was then, so it is now. The magic 
of the sea is the charming power of Sias- 
conset. It holds the observer fast, as the 
86 



Siasconset and Sea Worshipers 

Ancient Mariner held the wedding guest. 
It so captivates the loungers whom we saw 
lying on the beach that many of them will 
return summer after summer to the same 
enjoyment of indolence and day-dreams. 

When a strong wind is blowing out of 
the east, great waves pursue each other to- 
wards the beach, as if impatient to strike 
it and run foaming up to the bluffs before 
others can get there. But many days there 
are when the wind and the sea are gentle, 
when the waves follow each other lazily to 
the shore, and tumble wearily upon the 
sands as if too tired to go further. Then 
you are charmed by the scene as you 
look — 

** Eastward, still eastward, endlessly. 
At the sparkle and tremor of purple sea 
That rises before you a flickering hill. 
On and on to the shut of the sky.'' 



87 



Surf side and "Tom Never 



Surf side and Tom Never 

^^ * ^ This morning we took 

\£>]^lir!3tiat \ our red-wheeled, rub- 

FiFTH DAY \ ber - tired, runabout 
wagon for a ride to Surfside, which is the 
name given to a range of sand bluffs on 
the south shore of the island. 

As soon as we were rid of the town, we 
entered upon a soft road, winding across 
a vast extent of level and unfenced land 
which is covered with turf and adorned 
with luxuriant wild flowers of various col- 
ors, and the ruddy fruit of wild cranberry 
vines. The flora of the island is so rich 
and various that we cannot avoid noticing 
it wherever we go. By reason of the ab- 
sence of trees a great number of little 
flowering plants have established them- 
selves on this moorland, where they are 
91 



September Days on Nantucket 

developed with a luxuriance which is 
never attained in shaded places. 

<* The land in warm September's golden hours 

Pours forth the glory of the waning year ; 
And, far as sight can reach, the myriad flowers. 

In serried ranks, o'erspread the landscape here. 
The purple aster, and the golden-rod. 

Imperial flowers, stand side by side. 
And here, beneath the radiant smile of God, 

Lies the vast splendor gleaming far and wide. ' ' 

Our road ends on the edge of a bluff 
facing the sea. Nobody lives hereabouts 
except the crew of a life-saving station, 
whose presence indicates that wrecks are 
to be looked for on the reefs near this 
shore at any time of stormy weather. In 
the bibliography of the island there is a 
brochure which describes the wrecks of 
more than five hundred vessels during the 
years since the island was settled. East of 
the station stand the remains of a big hotel 
which was hopefully built for summer 
guests. The ocean is crumbling away a 
92 



Surf side and Tom Never 

narrow space of the bluff in front of it, 
gales have split it in twain and carried 
away an end of it, and still it holds up to 
the surges its painted legend, " Surfside 
Hotel," as if to attract guests from the 
southern seas. We looked into the ruined 
apartments, and pictured to ourselves the 
gay scenes that illumined them twenty 
summers ago when the hotel began its 
speculative career. 

The building was brought from Nar- 
ragansett Pier, and reconstructed on the 
bluff where its wreck now stands. A nar- 
row-gauge railroad connected it with the 
steamboat landing in Nantucket town, 
and during its first summer the road 
brought many guests. The Clan Coffin 
also came to the new hotel, and celebrated 
the memory of their ancestor Tristram, a 
leader of the company of proprietors of 
Nantucket, who drew lots for their home- 
steads in the summer of 1661. After the 
close of that first season, a letter written 
93 



September Days on Nantucket 

on the island was published in a Boston 
newspaper of December, 1881, saying: 
" The owners of the hotel are well satis- 
fied with their investment ; and well they 
may be, for against the predictions of 
croakers the first season's business excelled 
their expectations, and the future is big 
with promise." Alas ! for the fatality of 
first impressions. There was no season 
like the initial one. The owners had 
planned to surround the hotel with sum- 
mer cottages, and to make the hamlet 
a popular resort outrivaling Siasconset. 
They did not know how narrow and stiff 
are the limits of speculative ventures on 
Nantucket. 

From the wrecked hotel run lines of 
sandy and grassy wheel-tracks eastward, 
following the contour of the shore, and 
passing Tom Nevefs Head, Tom Nev- 
er's Pond, Tom Never' s Swamp. These 
three South Shore landmarks are named 
on every map of the island, but nobody 
94 



Surf side and Tom Never 

answers the question — Who was Tom 
Never ? 

We conclude from what we have read 
of Nantucket history that Tom Never 
was an Indian living on this shore about 
two hundred and twenty-five years ago, 
appointed by the English settlers to be 
master of the section, to watch for and 
oversee the " cutting-up " of stranded 
whales. We also conclude that he was 
a brother of Jack Never, an incorrigible 
Indian thief who, " not having the fear 
of God before his eyes but instigated by 
the Devil," did break " into Captain John 
Gardners house in the midel of the night 
and tooke out of Mr. Gardners pocket by 
the bead side five shillings and also opened 
a case and carried away a bottel with about 
a pint of Licquor in it ; " so says the court's 
record. 

The gain of land from the sea is notice- 
able along the shore from Tom Never's 
Head to Siasconset. The sea no longer 
95 



September Days on Nantucket 

reaches the bluffs, but is shut off by an 
area of sands extending some distance 
southward, and forming wide beaches. At 
other parts of the island the sea has gained 
from the land; as at Great Point, which 
is the North Cape of Nantucket, made, as 
geologists say, " of sands and detritus car- 
ried to the position by currents." The sea 
has eaten away the point to a distance of 
fourteen hundred feet within a century. 

There is no sea marge, no beach of any 
kind, at Surfside. The sandy face of the 
bluff slopes steeply into the water twenty 
feet deep; the surges slide up and down 
the slope, carrying away more and more 
of the sand every year to lodge it on some 
other part of the island shore. To-day a 
keen southwest wind is throwing the spray 
of every breaker into the air, and sending 
up to us, as we stand on the edge of the 
bluff, the salty smell of the sea. Spreading 
our rugs on the slope, we seat ourselves in 
front of the ocean. Between us and that 

96 



Surf side and Tom Never 

dark blue rim, miles away, where sky and 
ocean meet, not a sail is to be seen ; but 
we can see patches of blue and purple and 
green and gray, telling us that the sea is 
of all colors. One who has written admir- 
ingly of it says: "Those glimmering tints 
which often invest the tops of mountains 
are mere coruscations compared with these 
marine colors which are continually vary- 
ing and shifting into each other in the 
vivid splendor of the rainbow." With all 
its beauty, it remains the never satisfied sea, 
always speaking its " eternal whisperings " 
to the crumbling land. Tennyson called 
its voice the " moanings of the homeless 
sea ; " Aldrich heard in it a " strange artic- 
ulate sorrow ; " Bliss Carman fancied it 
to be " mourning about an ancient grief" 
None of these melancholy suggestions 
came to us while we listened. On the 
contrary, under the influences of sunshine 
and breeze, it seemed to be a voice of 



97 



September Days on Nantucket 

gladness. Exultingly did we repeat Whit- 
tier's verse : — 

" Good-by to pain and care. I take mine ease to-day. 
Here where these sunny waters break 
And ripples this keen breeze, I shake 

All burdens from the heart, all weary thoughts away." 

Such enjoyment is all that is to be 
found on the solitary bluffs of Surfside. 

Returning to town, we went down to 
the bathing-beach in the afternoon and 
sat on the rocks of the harbor jetty, watch- 
ing children who were searching in the 
edge of the sea for snails and tiny crabs. 
The sociable dog of the bathing-master 
invited us to bathe by going into shallow 
water, lying down in it, and looking at 
us with inquiring eyes. As we did not 
accept the invitation, he came ashore 
and laid himself beside us, as if to be ready 
for any service that we might need. We 
remember him as a " good fellow." 



98 



Maddaquet and the Men 
with a Hoe 



L.ofC. 



Maddaquet and the Men with a Hoe 

* l % S This morning we rode in 

^i? nDE^ > our red -wheeled, rubber- 
SIXTH DAY \ tired, runabout wagon to 
Maddaquet, on the western end of the 
island. At a short distance beyond the 
town we passed a granite stone set up on 
the roadside to mark the site of the house 
in which was born Abiah Folger, the 
mother of Benjamin Frankhn. Further 
away in the fields is seen a granite memo- 
rial of John Gardner, a prominent man 
among the earHer settlers of Nantucket, 
who prevented the founding of an aristo- 
cracy of landholders to govern the island, 
which was attempted by Tristram Coffin 
and Thomas Mayhew. The contest, bitter 
and revengeful, lasted seven years (from 
1673 to 1680). Gardner was supported 

lOI 



September Days on Nantucket 

by public opinion, but his party in voting 
had a majority of only two, and this was 
destroyed by the bribing of Thomas Macy 
and his son-in-law, William Worth, who 
suddenly " whipped over to the other 
side." Yet, in spite of this defection, 
Gardner managed the contest so skillfully 
that, when the Coffinites were summoned 
before Governor Lovelace in New York, 
they said in complaint of the skill of their 
opponents, "Every card they play is an 
ace, and every ace a trump." 

The road we are traveling loses its out- 
lines after a while in undulating fields, 
under patches of moss, lichen, and dry 
grasses; from these it emerges at short 
distances in faint wheel-tracks, hard and 
dry like the traces of vehicles that may 
have passed this way a long time ago. 
Our horse follows a trail, discernible under 
the wild vegetation, until we reach its end 
on a flat and sandy shore. Here we stop 



102 



Maddaquet and the Men with a Hoe 

to take our bearings and listen to the 
strange silence of the region. 

We have ridden to the edge of Madda- 
quet Harbor; not a boat, nor a landing- 
pier, nor a living thing is in sight ; not a 
sound is heard except that of the west 
wind, which is blowing on our faces and 
seems to affect us with its tonic proper- 
ties. It is the harbor and the shore where, 
as a popular tradition says, two English- 
men named Edward Starbuck and Thomas 
Macy, the latter with wife and children, 
coming from Massachusetts Colony in 
"an open boat," landed and spent the 
winter of 1659; ^^^ ^^^ xhsiix health, but, 
as is presumed, for their religious opinions. 
Here nobody could dispute a belief in the 
tenets of John Calvin, for the Indians who 
occupied the island knew neither Calvin 
nor the English tongue. As there was an 
abundance of forest wood in the vicinity, 
the two Englishmen, the woman, and the 



103 



September Days on Nantucket 

children were able to keep a fire burning 
through the winter ; otherwise they would 
have perished. After they had ended their 
hibernation, the tradition says that the men 
went abroad on the island with a hoe to 
dig for fertile soil, but it does not say what 
they found. To-day the region is more 
desolate than it was then. There is neither 
a tree to be seen, nor a man with a hoe. 

It may be doubted whether there was 
a harbor at Maddaquet in the year 1659, 
and whether there is truth in the tradition. 
If we turn to a chart made from surveys 
by British naval officers between the years 
1700 and 1720, which gives the outlines 
of Nantucket island with the shoals and 
soundings of adjacent waters, we find no 
harbor at Maddaquet ; but in place of the 
sandspit which now forms the southern 
boundary of the harbor, we find " coarse 
sand" under three fathoms depth of sea. 
The tradition says that the " open boat " 
passed around and outside Cape Cod; 
104 



Maddaquet and the Men with a Hoe 

and when meeting tempestuous weather, 
Macy's wife urged him to turn around and 
go back to their home ; to which he replied, 
"Woman, go below!" Without asking 
where "below" is located in an "open 
boat," let us notice the fact that Cape Cod 
was, as stated by Bartholomew Gosnold, 
who visited it in the year 1602, an island. 
The island extended from Race Point to 
Eastham ; between that town and Nauset 
there was a wide channel or strait from 
Barnstable Bay to the ocean. No boats 
went outside the Cape ; small craft always 
went down the Bay, under lee of the Cape, 
and out to sea through this passage, 
which was open, according to Gosnold, 
in the year 1602, and was also open, as 
the chart shows, in the year 1717. A 
memorandum written on the chart opposite 
to the passage, probably written by one 
of the surveyors, says : " Ye Place where 
I came through with a Whale Boat, being 
ordered by ye Government to look after 
105 



September Days on Nantucket 

ye Pirate Ship Whido, Bellamy Com- 
mander, cast away ye 26 April 1717, 
where I buried One Hundred & Two 
Men Drowned." 

That there were forests on Nantucket 
island when it was first occupied by white 
men has been disputed by geologists ; but 
the fact is amply certified in records which 
contain various laws enacted by the inhab- 
itants in town meeting assembled, to pro- 
tect their forests from destruction. For 
example : on Nanahuma Neck it was for- 
bidden " to fall any timber within its con- 
siderable woodland ; " on the peninsula of 
Coatue, which is now as barren of vegeta- 
tion as a sandspit (except where a species 
of cactus is existing), there were pine 
and cedar trees sufficiently dense in their 
growth to furnish a winter shelter for 
flocks of sheep ; Indians were claiming an 
ancient right to cut firewood there, when 
a town meeting forbade "the Cutting of 
any more Wood of any sort off from 
106 



Maddaquet and the Men with a Hoe 

Coatue." A law was also enacted by the 
town forbidding " to fall any more timber 
for rails and posts, and no timber for 
building howses," except at specified times. 

Turning from the past to the present, 
we discover a life-saving station a mile 
away on the southern shore, and north of 
us we see a small gray house. We drive 
across a field to the house and knock upon 
the door, which is opened by a woman in 
the dress of one who is never expecting 
a caller at this solitary end of the island. 
In answer to our inquiry for the location 
of any road on which we can travel back 
to the town, she points to a stake standing 
upright on a distant hillside, and says it is 
the place where we can find a trail leading 
into a road that enters the main street. 

This interview occurred outside the 
door ; but now her husband appears and 
cordially invites us into the house. We 
learn that he is the lord of an estate at the 
eastern end of the island, on which he has 
107 



September Days on Nantucket 

built several cottages that are annually- 
rented to summer people ; and when his 
tenants return to their homes on the main- 
land, it is his custom to retire to this re- 
mote corner in search of rest and sport 
with his gun. He was formerly a business 
man in New York city. He came to 
Nantucket in search of better health, and 
remained to enjoy what he came for. He 
told us that he had found the climate of 
the island very pleasant from May to 
December; that in summer the thermo- 
meter sometimes rises to eighty degrees 
during the day, but the temperature dur- 
ing the night is always pleasantly cool; 
and it is a satisfaction to know that every 
breeze touching the island comes clean 
and pure from the ocean. He politely 
offered to each of us a glass of whiskey; 
but, being away from home, and feeling 
that there was sufficient exhilaration in 
the air of Nantucket, we drank cold water. 
After thanking our host for his hospi- 
io8 



Maddaquet and the Men with a Hoe 

table attentions, we mounted our wagon, 
drove to the stake standing on a hillside, 
and turned into a trail which our horse 
appeared to know. It is now high noon. 
Bareheaded, in the glorious sunlight, we 
ride leisurely across a long, wide plain 
which in former times was a common 
where were pastured thousands of sheep, 
tended by shepherds during all the year. 
There is no sign of human life or labor to 
be seen. On each side of us are hills 
covered like the plain with tall wild grasses 
that have not been mowed since the sheep 
were killed. The tops of the grasses, yel- 
low and gray, are waving in the wind and 
flashing in the sunlight as we ride in 
friendly silence, our senses on the alert to 
catch every feature of the strange scenery 
which seems to have an emotional attrac- 
tion of its own. 

At last we emerged from this region on 
a traveled road that led into the main street 
of Nantucket town. 

109 



September Days on Nantucket 

In the afternoon we visited a shop where 
old colonial house furniture is exhibited, 
and looked with admiring eyes on mahog- 
any highboys and lowboys with flame and 
scroll tops, bandy legs, claw feet, and shell 
enrichments. As it is known that in- 
quisitors of the Quaker Society sometimes 
entered the houses of members, and with 
instruments removed ornaments from the 
furniture, it is not probable that such beau- 
tiful articles as these were commonly seen 
in the homes of colonial Nantucket. Then 
we went to the rooms of the Historical 
Association and examined its interesting 
memorials of other times. We ended the 
day with the enjoyment of hot salt water 
baths in a tidy bathing-house standing* on 
the shore. 



no 



TVauwinet and Sankaty 
Light 



Wauwinet and Sankaty Light 

^r>f ) This sunny morning, in 

^^atUt&at I our red-wheeled, rubber- 
SEVENTH DAY \ tired, runabout wagon 
we rode to Wauwinet, a hamlet on the 
eastern end of the island, nine mites from 
town as the road goes. 

Turning off from the macadamed thor- 
oughfare to Siasconset, we enter upon an 
old highway that veers to the northeast, 
and opens many views of the town we 
are leaving behind. Occasionally we pass 
between groups of fragrant pine-trees ; 
on hillsides we see large patches of hazel- 
nut bushes, the leaves being remarkably 
brilliant in the sunlight, and we catch 
the odors of sassafras and sweet ferns. In 
colonial times this region was sp^oken of 
as the garden of Nantucket. There were 
113 



September Days on Nantucket 

farms producing large crops of corn and 
wheat. Those old wheel-tracks that we see, 
covered by mealplum vines, are probably 
the remains of by-roads which connected 
neighboring farmhouses with the highway 
to town. Under the date of August 8, 
1761, President Stiles of Yale College 
wrote in his diary, " Mr. Josiah Barker of 
Nantucket told me that the Island has 
about 800 families on it. They have 6000 
or 7000 Sheep. They buy 50 or 60 
Sheep from the mainland yearly. They 
plant 900 to 1000 acres of Indian Corn." 
In truth, Nantucket men were farmers 
long before they became seamen. The 
first thing done by those who drew lots 
for homesteads in the year 1661 was to 
lay out fields for corn; and in the year 
1665 forty-eight farmers registered the ear- 
marks of herds and flocks then at pasture 
on the island. If they tilled the land 
in the careful manner of their British 
kinsmen, the farming accounts (could we 
114 



Wauwinet and Sankaty Light 

find them) would give an interesting in- 
sight of agricultural life more than two 
centuries ago. They would tell of women 
and children as helpers in the harvest 
fields ; of acres of grain and weights of 
wool produced ; of barley winnowed, and 
tailings given to pigeons, pigs, and horses ; 
of salting the bacon and brining the wheat ; 
of keeping of the flocks, and how the 
shepherd's wife was willing to lend a hand 
in "lambing tyme." But those early 
farmers left no mark save these old roads. 
We notice old houses and lands that are 
advertised "for sale;" the painted signs 
announcing the fact have become almost 
illegible while waiting for a buyer who 
does not come. Yonder we see Quaise 
Point, which John Swaine bought from 
the Indians in the year 1686, and paid for 
it a toll of one bushel of wheat annually 
during his life. There, in the time of the 
Revolution, was the country home of Ke- 
ziah CofRn, a famous woman who, while 
115 



September Days on Nantucket 

her husband was at sea on his first cruise, 
traded in pins and needles, and also kept 
a little school for the children of her 
neighborhood ; after a while she traded 
in larger merchandise than pins and 
needles; she estabhshed a system of mer- 
cantile business with connections in Lon- 
don, became an importer and a smuggler, 
acquired wealth and a farm at Quaise, and 
built what was called the best house on the 
island. Her husband gave up the pursuit 
of whales in distant seas, and being a con- 
templative man, he came ashore and 
quietly enjoyed the home and fortune 
which the skill of his masterly wife had 
acquired. In the Revolutionary War 
Aunt Keziah, as she was called, was, like 
a majority of the women of Nantucket, 
a Tory; and it is said that she dressed 
herself in black as a sign of her sorrow 
for the rebellion of the colonies against 
his most gracious Majesty the King. 
Passing by the site of Palpus, we are 
ii6 



Wauwinet and Sankaty Light 

reminded of its ancient House of Entertain- 
ment, and how often the people of the 
town rode to it in their calashes, a century 
ago, to enjoy its exhilarating bowls and 
spend an idle day. Then touching the 
whip to our horse, we sped along the road 
to the hamlet called Wauwinet. That was 
the name of the Indian sachem who ruled 
over this region before the white men came. 

We hitched our horse to a post standing 
in the sand, the last remnant of an ancient 
fence of rails, and looked about us. We 
saw a house prepared to serve fish dinners, 
three small dwellings occupied by sum- 
mer people, and a sailboat landing a pic- 
nic party just arrived from town. 

Not far away is the Haulover, a narrow 
beach having the ocean on one side of it, 
and on the other side a branch of Nan- 
tucket harbor. The beach attracts us at 
once ; it seems to be the place where " it 
is always afternoon." We hear the faint 
" dick-a-dee " of a sandpiper while it runs 
117 



September Days on Nantucket 

and stops and runs again, searching die 
shore for something to eat ; and the squeak 
of gulls that are wheeling and soaring and 
flitting low to examine whatever is drifting 
on the sea; and the cry of the piping 
plover whose voice, Thoreau says, is like 
"a fugacious part in the dirge which is 
ever played along the shore for those 
mariners who have been lost in the deep 
since it was first created." Rare and beau- 
tiful species of shore birds are not here ; 
if a solitary one should venture to alight 
on any part of the island, it would proba- 
bly be killed by a sportsman or a natu- 
ralist who is seeking to destroy the creature 
that deserves to live. 

Along the edge of the ocean we strolled, 
picking up shells ; their delicate hinges 
were broken and the homes were empty, 
as if the little beings that had lived in 
them went out this morning for an airing 
and the thievish waves seized their homes, 
scoured them clean, and flung them on the 
ii8 



Wauwinet and Sankaty Light 

sand. It is easy to recall the argument 
of an eloquent preacher that each of these 
tiny shells is as " full of the idea of design 
as any star in the heavens, and if the neb- 
ular hypothesis be the explanation of the 
creation of worlds, there is no star that is 
so far advanced in the order of develop- 
ment as these minute shells and their un- 
known tenants." ^ 

Through our glasses we watch the ships 
that appear and disappear on the distant 
horizon, and the flotsams drifting in the 
currents. South of us stands the tower of 
Sankaty Light, which nightly flashes its 
white flame — 

«* Onward ever, and outward ever. 

Over the uttermost verge of the sea," — 

except when dazed seabirds plunge head- 
long through the glass lantern and extin- 
guish the light.^ 

^ Thomas R. Slicer. 

8 " Nantucket, April 2d, 1902. Two wild ducks, 
119 



September Days on Nantucket 

The cliiF on which the hghthouse stands 
rises about eighty feet above high tide, 
and has attracted much attention from 
geologists, who have spoken of it as the 
most interesting section of the island on 
account of its fossiliferous deposits. Unlike 
other cliffs on these shores, it is covered 
by a thick growth of wild vegetation, which, 
it is said, is due to the northward advance 
of Siasconset Beach, fending the cliff from 
the action of the sea. 

As an example of the imagination of 
correspondents who have passed a day or 
two on the island and visited this shore, 
let us read from a letter published in a 
Boston newspaper of July, 1852: "Nan- 
tucket is itself a great beacon ; and, for the 
protection of Vineyard Sound and hun- 

weighing about seven pounds each, crashed through 
the lantern of the lighthouse at Great Pomt last night, 
extinguishing the light. The broken glass plate mea- 
sured 6 feet by 27 inches and was three eighths of an 
inch thick." — Press Report, 
120 



Wauwinet and Sankaty Light 

dreds of ports on the coast, it is furnished 
with quite a constellation of lighthouses." 
The truth is that the island has but two 
lighthouses, besides Sankaty, useful in 
navigation ; one of these is a harbor light 
on Brant Point, and the other a sea light 
on the northernmost extremity of Coatue. 
Another correspondent, writing to a Boston 
newspaper of July, 1877, says: "Nan- 
tucket is replete with monuments grown 
gray with age, Indian relics, and other sad- 
der ones snatched from the vasty deep. 
From Tuckernuck to Sankaty Light there 
is n't a rod of land without its traditions, 
nor a living being from whom an hour's 
converse cannot obtain an interesting stock 
of information." A postscript of this let- 
ter seems to reveal the writer of it ; for it 
says : " The watering-place beat has made 
his appearance at Nantucket." 

Failing to find the gray monuments, and 
the sad relics, and the living being on every 
rod of land waiting to give us a stock of 
121 



September Days on Nantucket 

information, we follow the summer custom 
and lie down on the sloping sands. The 
day is before us as well as the ocean, and 
we are not in haste to return to the town. 
While the lace-shaped spindrifts of the 
surf are running up near to our feet, we 
sing the words of Carolyn Wells : — 

** Come with the rest of us 
Down by the sea ; 
There is where we 
Show out the best of us ; 
Holiday keep 
Chums with the waves ; 
When saucy winds sing. 
All of our cares 
Back of them fling 
And bury them deep 
Down by the sea.** 



122 



"The T^own and the Captains 



The Town and the Captains 

C^ i Our seven sunny 

^Untiar mow | days win come to 
LAST DAY ^ an end this noon, 
when the steamer Gay Head is to carry us 
away from the island. 

At an early hour we wandered into the 
country, without a purpose except to 
enjoy once more the delicious outdoor air 
of Nantucket. We turned our steps into 
an ancient burial field, read the inscrip- 
tions on old gravestones, and then seated 
ourselves in the sunlight on top of a brick 
tomb dated a hundred years ago, and 
talked about the pleasures of the week, 
never to be forgotten. The ground 
around us was covered with tiny wild 
flowers and the red remains of brier- 
roses that bloomed last June. Before us 
125 



September Days on Nantucket 

the landscape extended to the ridge of a 
distant hill, on the edge of which we saw 
the silhouette of a purple cow, the very- 
cow described in the Nonsense Book, that 
" ate of naught but violet flowers." 

Then there passed along the highway 
an old man driving a cart. Seeing us sit- 
ting atop the tomb he cried out : — 

" Hello, Cap'n ! Don't fall in ! You '11 
get in soon enough if you wait ! " 

We approved his wit, thanked him for 
his warning, and, recognizing him as a 
representative of the island, we bade him 
good-by. 

The permanent residents of the town, 
some of whom live in those comfortable- 
looking houses that are to be seen in 
many streets, are proud of their descent 
from brave seafaring men, whose sea-jour- 
nals, containing the story of voyages and 
discoveries, are the historical literature of 
Nantucket. Although they did not invite 
the summer stranger to make their island 
126 



^he Town and the Captains 

home the scene of his leisure, they are 
glad to see him, provided he shall write no 
silly letters about it to newspapers,^ nor 
defame their revered captains. 

A fine specimen of the " silly letter " 
appeared in a New York newspaper, 
August 23, 1896, in which the writer of 
it, describing " Nantucket twenty-five 
years ago," said : " The inhabitants re- 
garded a stranger coldly, but compassion- 
ately. He was received on probation, 
which was not at all a matter of form. 
Cases were not unknown when gallants 
from the mainland had been chased over 
dune and dale the livelong night by fish- 
ermen as wrathful as they were sturdy. . . . 
A funereal peace prevailed in the town, the 
deeper for the absence of undertakers. 
The doors of the poor-house and of the 

* The general inability of traveling correspondents to 

esteem Nantucket rightly is illustrated by one who wrate 

to a New York newspaper : *' Baalbec was a puzzle, 

Tadmor was a wonder ; but Nantucket is a miracle." 

127 



September Days on Nantucket 

jail were never locked ; the selectmen re- 
jected keys as extravagant luxuries." The 
same correspondent, describing a fire " late 
one night," said : " There was a mighty 
commotion throughout the old burgh. 
The Queen Anne bell clanged shrilly. 
Men, women, and children devotedly 
rushed to the fire. The wind was blowing 
a- gale. The women formed lines and 
passed and repassed buckets. The chil- 
dren spread wet blankets on roofs and 
stamped out sparks. The men kept the 
hand engines hot with pumping. The 
water supply was dependent on wells which 
were quickly exhausted ; but no matter, 
there was an abundance of strong and will- 
ing arms. The lines were extended further 
and further. The engines were moved 
hither and thither, and so the deluging 
was never slackened. With the morning 
light the families returned to their homes, 
drenched, disordered, wild-haired, but tri- 
umphant," etc. 

128 



The Town and the Captains 

As to the revered captains, they are not, 
as some newspaper correspondents have 
described them, "battered old hulks;" 
nor are they the jolly mariners of the 
drama who exclaim, " Blast your eyes ! " 
and " Shiver my timbers ! " when convers- 
ing with each other. They are heroes of 
the sea, who have been anointed with oil. 
Some of them went afloat before they 
were twelve years old; some of them 
while boys doubled Cape Horn when " it 
was nothing but haul down and clew up," 
in rain, sleet, and snow. Now, having 
furled their topsails and retired from a 
life at sea, they meet socially, not as a 
club, but as men whose lives have been 
passed in similar dangers and experiences. 
They sit in their own armchairs, in their 
own room, on the first floor of the old 
brick building that stands at the foot of 
Main Street, and there they intelligently 
discuss all current topics. A man who 
happens to be in the public eye and is 
129 



September Days on Nantucket 

steering a wrong course, or a summer vis- 
itor to the island who is carrying too many 
sails, will be passed with the conclusion 
that " He may possibly get over the bar 
at low water ; " a reminder of the fact that 
only vessels of the shallowest draft can 
cross the harbor bar when the tide has 
ebbed. 

A townswoman describes the captains 
as chivalrous and upright men, kindly 
if humorously tolerant, whose faces are 
strong and serene, and whose failing sight 
is yet keen enough to see straight through 
a pretender. "As they sit around the 
fire," she says, "or when summer lures 
them out to the sidewalk, and they tilt 
back their chairs comfortably under the 
trees, exchanging friendly greetings with 
passers-by, we look upon these splendid 
men and think how soon the time will 
come when not one of them will be left; 
and we devoutly hope that the ready- 
writer will spend his vacation elsewhere, 
130 



The Town and the Captains 

and so leave us in peace with our cap- 
tains upon the blessed island which by 
their presence they have made sacred to 



us forever." ^ 



The town offers to strangers no spe- 
cial attractions for passing the time. For- 
merly there were to be seen in it collec- 
tions of curious things that had been 
brought by Nantucket whalemen from the 
ends of the earth. A whaleman's widow 
had a museum of interesting South Sea 
curiosities which she exhibited and talked 
about to her audiences, pointing a long 
stick to the articles described in her fluent 
speech. Her curiosities were real ones, 
and her stories were true. Now the curio 
business is in the hands of summer shop- 
keepers, and the widow's occupation is 
not in fashion. 

In the shops they offer for sale excel- 
lent photographs of scenery in all parts of 
the island. They offer corals and tropical 
^ A Protest, by Mary E. Starbuck. 



September Days on Nantucket 

shells, whale's teeth, swords of the sword- 
fish, sea mosses inclosed in scallop shells, 
old furniture, pewter porringers, brass can- 
dlesticks, blue chinaware, and many small 
articles of bricabrac. They also offer a 
few old shingles taken from old houses. 
These are tied together with ribbons; 
sometimes they form covers to a series of 
interesting photographs, appealing to you 
like a blind beggar with a certificate of 
age and character. They may be suitable 
tokens of a visit to Nantucket ; but we 
prefer a new shingle to an old one when 
we have any use for shingles. 

The town is neither quaint nor peculiar 
in its appearance. The odd, the antique, 
and the simple in manners and customs, 
which, under the name of quaintness, were 
characteristic of Nantucket for nearly two 
centuries, and are still spoken of by those 

** native here and to the manner bom," 

are now unknown. The heart of the town, 
132 



The Town and the Captains 

comprising an area of thirty-six acres, on 
which stood three hundred and sixty build- 
ings, including costly mansions, public ed- 
ifices, and valuable stores, was burned to 
ashes in a night of July, 1846. A Nan- 
tucket newspaper of that year says : " No 
forms of language can convey an accurate 
idea of the horrors of that memorable night. 
No rain had fallen in a long time, and the 
houses, which were chiefly of wood, had 
become, by the agency of many long days 
of unbroken sunshine, amply ripened for 
the fire. The flames flew from house to 
house, crossing streets, lanes, and courts 
with such unaccountable and capricious 
irregularity as to set at defiance the calcu- 
lations and exertions of firemen and engi- 
neers. Explosions of gunpowder and tor- 
rents of water seemed alike unavailing to 
stop them, though directed by the most 
desperate and determined spirits. Men 
fell powerless in the highways, utterly 
worn down and disheartened. Fire engines 



September Days on Nantucket 

were yielded to the flames which poured 
in upon them from opposite quarters. 
Vast quantities of oil stored in sheds and 
yards, heated in the casks, burst forth upon 
the ground, became at once ignited, and 
rolled in fiery floods into the harbor, cov- 
ering the surface of the water to a great 
distance with sheets of flame." 

The value of the property destroyed 
was estimated by the selectmen of the 
town to be one million dollars, of which 
only a third part was insured. The fire 
sifted the population and compelled many 
families to move to the mainland and begin 
anew the work of life. The burnt area 
was gradually rebuilt, but there is not to 
be found in it any indication of that spirit 
of enterprise which caused the old town to 
be ranked as the third important city of 
Massachusetts. 

The daily movement of the throng of 
people which seeks Nantucket in July and 
August is interesting to persons who have 
134 



The Town and the Captains 

come from homes in quiet places ; but 
summer days on the island are not more 
delightful than the days of September and 
October, after the movement has ceased. 
Those who describe the glories of these 
months speak of the wide horizons that 
greet the eye, of the pure colors in sun- 
sets, of the soft lights that rest on the ocean 
when stars fill the heavens with a peculiar 
splendor; of the swamps, hillsides, and val- 
leys brilliant with warm shades of red, 
brown, and yellow. There being no for- 
ests on the island, all the low-growing 
shrubs show themselves in their natural 
character ; the sedgy margins of creeks and 
ponds and the mossy carpet of the com- 
mons exhibit an indescribable beauty of 
their own. The surf rolls lazily against the 
shore, or under a freshening breeze it 
breaks with exultant leap upon the sandy 
beaches. The wine of life is pressed to 
the lips in such generous measure that the 
tarrier on the island rejoices to have seen 
135 



September Days on Nantucket 

Nantucket after the season of summer has 
ended. Indeed he might say, as said 
Ulysses to Calypso of the enchanting 
island : — 

** I '11 drift no more upon the dreary sea. 
No yearning have I now, and no desire. 
Here would I be, at ease upon this isle. 
Set in the glassy ocean's azure swoon. 
With sward of parsley and of violet. 
And these low-crying birds that haunt the deep." 



136 



Various Opinions 

concerning 

"^aint Nantucket"" 



Various Opinions concerning 



" Quaint Nantucket " by its contents makes 
persuasive appeal to lovers of endlessly interest- 
ing Nantucket, who are not few, and to lovers 
of the quaint who are many. Mr. Bliss has 
given us a very delightful book. From sea 
journals, from records of the Friends' Meeting, 
from town archives, he has gathered material 
for his sketches of the Quaker island as it was 
long ago. He has shown much wisdom by 
choosing the salient, the picturesque and the 
typical ; and since he has gleaned solely in the 
interests of entertainment, and with no theory 
to buttress, the result is instruction without 
dullness and knowledge gained by exceedingly 
pleasant paths. No chapter is more interest- 
ing than that which presents Nantucket under 
the Quaker rule, through which broke often 
the willful nature of Quaker maidens. Sarah 
Darling, for example, was " treated with " by 
the brethren for consorting with a lover not of 
the faith ; but they " don't find any disposition 
in her to condemn herself; " Deborah Smith 
who, when dealt with for not using the thee 
and thou, sent back word that she " did n't 
think she ever should ! " — Boston Transcript. 



138 



^aint Nantucket'* 



William Root Bliss has given us a delight- 
ful book in his " Quaint Nantucket." He has 
gone below the surface and produced a picture 
of the Nantucket of a bygone time that is full 
of interesting facts and memories. The envi- 
ronment of the islanders developed personal 
traits, and Mr. Bliss has found evidence of it 
in chronicles of the town, in records of the 
Society of Friends, and in ancient log-books. 
The chapter entitled the Dominion of the 
Quakers is curious and interesting. The ex- 
tent to which the Meeting interfered with the 
personal concerns of young and old is a singu- 
lar example of early American theocracy. The 
log-books of the whaling fleets are a source 
of constant delight. Mr. Bliss tells a story of 
an old salt who removed from Nantucket to 
the banks of the Hudson where he became a 
farmer. One day he drove to the city with a 
load of produce, to be gone three days. It was 
five years before he got back to his family. He 
found a ship fitting out for a whaling voyage, 
and the restless longing in his blood was roused 
and away to sea he went. — Brooklyn Eagle, 



139 



Various Opinions concerning 



We have had occasion more than once to 
give hearty commendation to the books about 
old New England, written by William Root 
Bliss. In " Colonial Times on Buzzard's Bay," 
" Side Glimpses from the Colonial Meeting 
House," and other books, Mr. Bliss has recre- 
ated New England as it was, and he is the first 
to give to the reading public just what he found 
instead of what a loyal New Englander might 
like to have found. In " Quaint Nantucket " 
we learn how the people of the island made 
their settlement, and established their govern- 
ment, how they were more loyal to the Dutch 
of New York than to the English, how Indians 
were punished and the Quaker Meeting was 
established. Here are extracts from court re- 
cords and journals of sea rovers, just as they 
were written. The intelligent reader would 
prefer to have such materials with which to 
make his own pictures, rather than be told how 
life looked to somebody else. One does not 
have to see Nantucket to appreciate Mr. Bliss's 
very interesting book. Harvard should make 
him a professor of history. — Philadelphia In- 
quirer, 



140 



^aint Nantucket " 



After reading Mr. Bliss's book we are left 
with the impression of a very interesting history 
of Nantucket. A striking chapter is that which 
deals with sea journals. In particular the jour- 
nal of Peleg Foulger, who interspersed his sea 
news with moral reflections, is a fascinating doc- 
ument. 

" We Struck a large Spermaceti and killed 
her and then we cut a Scuttle in her head and 
a man Got in up to his Armpits and dipt al- 
most six hogsheads of clear oyle out of her 
case, besides six more out of the Noddle. He 
certainly doth hit the right that mingles profit 
with delight." 

That little observation with its pleasantly 
mixed savour of Herrick and of the common- 
sense 1 8th century, might serve as the motto of 
Mr. Bliss's volume. It were to be wished in 
the interests of profit and delight that books 
thus dealing with local history might be col- 
lected in the large centres. In the library of 
the State of Massachusetts " Quaint Nan- 
tucket " would assuredly occupy an honourable 
place. — ^^ Liter ature^^ London Times^ 



141 



Various Opinions concerning 



Mr. Bliss has the Xxw^ fia'ir for the quaint, 
and knows how to distinguish it from the 
merely accidental. His " Quaint Nantucket," 
though written with a light pen and deft, and 
lighted up by a glint of humor here and there 
as befits the subject, is, in fact, the result of 
serious study, and must always contribute its 
share to the history of economics in early New 
England and of morals and manners in early 
times. The well-conceived volume contains 
extracts from ancient town records, from the 
Friend's Meeting, and journals of the sea-rovers 
who for two centuries made the fame of the 
Island of Nantucket. The selections are made 
with fine discrimination, and so ably woven to- 
gether that the book is entirely unique, and 
may well serve as a model for students of our 
early history. Then men of earliest Nantucket 
were by no means models of godliness, nor the 
women either. But they had the charm of 
strong originality, of a robust personality, and 
this book makes them appear very real and very 
much alive. — New York Evangelist, 



142 



" ^aint Nantucket '' 

A book pleasing to those who remember 
Nantucket as it was before electric lights made 
commercial that dear old town, is the story of 
its early life entitled " Quaint Nantucket." In 
this book, where every chapter is interesting, 
none is more so than that relating to the birth 
and growth of Quakerism. Either there are 
fuller records in Nantucket, or Friends there 
had improved in severity on the methods of 
English brethren, for the laws of the meeting 
were so tyrannical that the reader wonders why 
it did not die sooner than it did. Members 
were disowned for permitting their children to 
marry " out of meeting," for " keeping a violin 
to play upon," and even for the way they 
dressed their hair. In spite of the Quaker in- 
fluence, we find that Stephen Norton swore 
" one profane oath," and " one profane curse ; " 
and in accordance with its spirit, when the town 
desired to be protected against fires, the select- 
men were instructed to buy ladders and buckets 
" as cheap as they can." — Springfield Republi- 
can. 



143 



Various Opinions concerning 



Those who take up " Quaint Nantucket " 
with the idea that they are getting hold of anew 
guide-book will be disappointed. Mr. Bliss has 
taken his subject more seriously. His narra- 
tive covers a period of two hundred years, and 
it ends with the extinction of the whaling in- 
dustry. It is a curious fact that whales began 
to play an active part in the affairs of Nan- 
tucket as far back as 1668, when the settlers 
made a bargain with Indians, concerning whales 
that drifted upon the shores. The shores of 
the island were marked out in sections and 
sachems were appointed to supervise the cut- 
ting up of stranded whales and to divide the 
shares. This led to disputes between claimants, 
and appeals were made to the island court which 
decreed : — " That no Rack Whale that come 
ashore in any sachims bounds shall be cut up 
until all the masters of the shares that belong to 
that whale do com together." . . . 

Mr. Bliss has made an extremely interesting 
volume, which throws a most vivid light upon 
early Nantucket affairs. — Boston Beacon, 



144 



" ^aint Nantucket " 



" Saints Preserve Us ! " . . . The author 
of " Quaint Nantucket " says, " Quakerism 
was a power that suppressed the natural emo- 
tions, dulled ambition, destroyed manliness, and 
reduced the thoughts and actions of men to 
such a uniform level that one searches in vain 
for any individual greatness during the period 
of its dominion over Nantucket." The Quak- 
ers may have presented a forbidding side which 
the author has seized upon, losing sight of their 
Christian sweetness. Verily, I can sympathize 
with that Nantucket lady, born among the 
Friends, who perusing the chapter, " The 
Dominion of the Quakers," exclaimed : " I 
would like to buy a dozen of these books that I 
might throw them in the fire ! " The author 
continues : " Those plain, square, shingle-sided, 
unpainted houses, whose cold and barren look 
tells of the nearness of the sea, are reminders of 
the Quakerism which ruled Nantucket for more 
than a hundred years." Saints preserve us ! 
That was a quaintness brought from the mother 
country. How otherwise could our respected 
friend have found so charming a title for his 
book. — E. V. Hallett ; to Nantucket Inquirer, 



145 



Electroiyped and printed by H. O. Houghton &" Co, 
Cambridge, Mass., U.S. A. 



JUN 6 - i«2 



JUN 6 1902 



JUN. 6 t902 



1 9 n' 



